“They took the bait.” I can almost see Warner’s big, goofy smile through the phone as I pace around the island in my kitchen. “It’s sitting in a commercial warehouse right now. The bugs picked up a couple of names that mean nothing so far, but we’re working on it. Also, our C.I. at Corleone’s just confirmed that 12, 24, and 36 were at dinner two nights ago.”
36. New code name for Aref.
“I’m working on a warrant for the restaurant’s surveillance videos, but her descriptions of the three of them match. She recognized 12 from the last time they were there.”
I’ll bet she did, my jealous streak snarls. “Did she overhear anything valuable?”
“That both 36 and 12 are very pleased about something.”
I used to like getting calls from Warner. Now I dread them. Maybe because I see the walls closing in on Luke. And fast. “Hey, I was thinking of swinging by and dropping lunch off for him. When’s the next surveillance detail?”
“Ah, shit. I just pulled Bill and Franky off him. My agent has a huge rip planned in NoPo that I need all the guys on. Two kilos’ worth of coke.”
“Okay. I need to touch base with him at some point soon though.”
“I’m sure he’s busy setting up cars to steal.”
I roll my eyes. “Yeah, probably.”
“Did Sinclair call you again?”
“No.” Thank God, Sinclair’s eased off me a bit, letting the proper channels work. “Why?”
“Just . . . if he does, just say yes to whatever he tells you to do and then ignore him and keep doing what you’re doing, at your own pace. No one can expect 12 to spill his guts after a few meets.”
Alarm bells go off inside my head. “Is he talking about pulling me off this case again?”
“Don’t worry about that. You’re in too deep for him to pull you out.”
You have no idea.
“How about I put the guys on you tomorrow. Does that work?”
I lick a gob of tomato sauce off my thumb. “Yeah, I guess. I’ll just go . . . kill time somewhere.”
“Don’t you have pictures to take and homeless to feed?”
“I suppose.”
“It’s a rough life you lead, Bertelli.”
“Yeah, yeah.” I set my phone down and go about wrapping some sandwiches in foil, then packing them into my oversized purse, along with my camera.
Stanley paces at the door, like he knows who I’m going to see. “Sorry, not this time.”
Luke’s eyes light up the second I step into the office, and my insides tighten. I knew this would be the right move.
“Can we help you, miss?” Miller asks gruffly.
“You can’t.” Luke is on his feet, coming around his desk within seconds to plant a kiss on my lips. “This is a nice surprise. You want to go and grab lunch?”
“Actually, I was in the mood to cook this morning, so . . .” I hold open my purse and he peers in. And groans. “Damn, is that what I think it is?”
“Can you take off for an hour?”
He pulls his wallet and keys from his desk in answer.
“Actually, why don’t you let me drive. I can’t surprise you if you’re driving.” And, if for some reason someone comes to check up on 12’s whereabouts, they’ll see his uncle’s Cayenne that he borrowed and assume he hasn’t gone anywhere.
“I’ve never actually been here,” Luke says as we step through the entranceway of the Japanese Garden, one of Portland’s highlights and a place I’ve visited at least once a week since I began this case, both for the serenity and the chance to experiment with my camera. Enough that the lady charging admission at the front waves at me.
“Why doesn’t that surprise me?” I smile back at him. “I’d love to see it in the fall, when the leaves begin to change.”
“Then we’ll come here in the fall and you can see it all.” There’s a pause. “Right?”
“Right.” I smother any doubt in that one word with a broad smile and then focus on the oddly shaped trees and exotic pagodas ahead. Inside, sadness is quickly building. I have no idea where this case will be by then, if this thing with the Porsche is going to pan out. Luke may very well be behind bars by the fall.
He could hate my guts.
“What’s wrong?”
He’s frowning at me, and I realize that I’m not hiding my feelings very well after all.
“Nothing. Come on.” I grab his hand and lead him down my favorite path. Acres of beautifully cultivated land are divided into five themed gardens. Stone pathways weave throughout, climbing hills, edged with exotically shaped bushes and rich green moss, connecting bridges over ponds and streams. Each plant, each tree, each man-made structure was placed with such intent, creating an enchanting serenity that I’ve come to love.
“How easy is it to get lost in here?” he murmurs as we wind along the path, through a denser section. We haven’t crossed paths with a single person yet, which is kind of nice.
“Not easy enough. See that waterfall over here?” I point out the gentle cascade, and then hold my camera up to show him a shot I took of it when I was fooling around here a few weeks ago. It was a rare sunny day, the rays hitting the rocks in such a way that the water sprays sparkle.
“This is amazing, Rain.” He takes the camera from me and begins flipping through the images, a serious frown drawing his brow together. “Why haven’t you ever shown me any of these?”
“I don’t really know what I’m doing yet.”
“Sure looks like you do,” he murmurs, and my ego swells.
“Besides, I didn’t think you’d be into that sort of thing.”
“I’m into anything you’re into.” A smile curls over his lips. “Have any pictures of me?”
“Not yet,” I lie. That memory card is hidden away, for just me.
“Hmm . . . we’ll have to change that.” He hands my camera back to me with an arrogant smirk. “So, where are the picnic tables? Because I’m starving.”
I burst out with laughter. “That’s the thing . . .” I loop my arm through his and pull him off the main path, to head up a set of perfectly staggered stone steps. “We’re technically not allowed to eat in here, so we’ll have to do it where it’s not so obvious.”
“Are you suggesting we break the garden’s law?” His eyes widen with mock seriousness.
“Because you have a problem with that, right?”
“That’s right, I do. You’re leading me astray with your wicked ways.”
“I’ve been known to do that.” I chuckle. “Relax. It’s a Wednesday and they’re calling for heavy rain this afternoon, so no one’s going to bother us.” I know because I tend to come here on those days and stand on the Moon Bridge, letting the drops soak through my hair, my clothes, and my skin as I capture the downpour using the waterproof casing that I bought.
He smiles. “Don’t worry about me. I think my conscience can handle breaking the garden’s law.”
I hesitate. “Your conscience is already handling quite a bit, though, isn’t it?” We haven’t so much as hinted at Luke’s work with his uncle since the night on the yacht. Either Elmira was right and pillow talk does loosen these guys’ lips substantially or he regrets ever telling me.
By the look on his face, I’m afraid it may be the latter, and I need to be careful. To be honest, I’m not sure I want to know. It will only add to the guilt. I brought him here because it’s private enough to enjoy our time together but public enough that it can’t get out of hand again, like it did at the movies.
“It’s getting a little bit harder lately, but nothing I can’t deal with,” he finally admits.
“Do you plan on doing it forever?”
“I dunno . . .” He kicks a loose stone off the path and follows it as it skitters away. “I’ve just always figured I’d spend my life working for and with Rust. I don’t know what else I’d do.”
“Well, you could just work in the garage, right? And you like fixing and reselling those cars with Jesse.”
His jaw tightens. “It bothers you, doesn’t it?”
I sense the first bricks of a wall being laid between us, and that’s something I absolutely can’t have. Slipping my arm around his waist, I step in front of him, my body intentionally pressed against his, as I look up into bright blue eyes that I’ve begun to see in my sleep. “I just don’t want you to get into trouble, or get hurt.”
“I’ll be fine.” He pushes my hair back from my face and smiles. So confident.
So very wrong.
“And what are you planning on doing, anyway, ‘Miss Figuring Out Life’?”
So he remembers that ambiguous answer. He really was listening to me that first day. “I’m not sure yet. It’s hard to know which path to take when you’re so young, when you have so much to experience.”
His stomach grumbles between us, making us both laugh and his cheeks turn just a touch pink. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen him at all embarrassed. We step into a small, leafy alcove with a simple wooden bench and I hand Luke his sandwich. He has it unwrapped and in his mouth before I even sit down.
“You’re the fastest eater I’ve ever met in my life,” I muse.
“So, seriously . . .” He balls the foil up in his fist, his tone growing somber. “You’re not planning on going back to D.C., are you? I mean, I know you have your friends and family there, but . . .” His words trail off.
I’m a natural liar. I tell lies all day long. So why is it becoming harder to lie to Luke with each passing day that we spend together? I feel the urge to get up, to step farther away, as if that will somehow make this easier. I wander over to a nearby lattice structure. “I don’t know. Maybe one day.” I hesitate, knowing I shouldn’t make this harder on myself by asking. “Do you want me to stay?”
“Maybe.” Sincere eyes meet mine. “Honestly, I don’t really know what I’m doing with my life or how things are going to play out here. But I do know that, if I looked out my window tomorrow and knew that you didn’t live across from me anymore . . .” He clears his throat and ends with a soft, “I wouldn’t like it. At all.”
“I know what you mean.” I turn away from him so he can’t read the fear on my face. More and more, I catch myself trying to imagine a permanent life here. A real life. With Luke. It always ends with the same damning question: how could that ever work, with him being who he is and me being who I am?
It can’t.
That reality weighs more heavily on me, but I have to push my growing disappointment down and keep pretending for Luke’s benefit. For the success of the case.
“I do love Oregon.” My gaze wanders over the quiet, natural beauty surrounding us, which isn’t limited to just this garden. “Being near the river, and the ocean, and the rocky mountains, and all this nature . . . the weather.”
He chuckles. “I’ve never met anyone who actually loves rain. It’s kind of weird. But cool, too,” he adds quickly, as if afraid to offend me. “I just don’t get it.”
I shrug. “It’s not so much that I love rain. I just have a healthy respect for what it does. People hate it, but the world needs rain. It washes away dirt, dilutes the toxins in the air, feeds drought. It keeps everything around us alive.”
“Well, I have a healthy respect for what the sun does,” he counters with a smile.
“I’d rather have the sun after a good, hard rainfall.”
He just shakes his head at me but he’s smiling. “The good with the bad?”
“Isn’t that life?”
He frowns. “Why do I sense a metaphor behind that?”
“Maybe there is a metaphor behind that.” One I can’t very well explain to him without describing the kinds of things I see every day in my life. The underbelly of society—where twisted morals reign and predators lurk, preying on the lost, the broken, the weak, the innocent. Where a thirteen-year-old sells her body rather than live under the same roof as her abusive parents, where punks gang-rape a drunk girl and then post pictures of it all over the internet so the world can relive it with her. Where a junkie mom’s drug addiction is readily fed while her children sit back and watch.
Where a father is murdered because he made the mistake of wanting a van for his family.
In that world, it seems like it’s raining all the time. A cold, hard rain that seeps into clothes, chills bones, and makes people feel utterly wretched.
Many times, I see people on the worst day of their lives, when they feel like they’re drowning. I don’t enjoy seeing people suffer. I just know that if they make good choices, and accept the right help, they’ll come out of it all the stronger for it.
What I do enjoy comes after. Three months later, when I see that thirteen-year-old former prostitute pushing a mower across the front lawn of her foster home, a quiet smile on her face. Eight months later, when I see the girl who was raped walking home from school with a guy who wants nothing from her but to make her laugh. Two years later, when I see the junkie mom clean and sober and loading a shopping cart for the kids that the State finally gave back to her.
Those people have seen the sun again after the harshest rain, and they appreciate it so much more.
Luke has seen only the gold watches and fancy cars, luxurious apartments and beautiful women, promises of endless money and opportunities. But sooner or later, he is going to face the storm that comes from the choices he has made. It’s going to pummel him where he stands, drown him in regret, punish him for his ignorance and greed.
I can only hope it’s harsh enough to make him leave this life behind for a new one. An honest one that he can be happy with.
I focus on the moss growing between the stones by my feet, unsure of what else to say except, “The world needs rain.”
“Well, I have you. Does that count?” When I dare raise my head, I find that his eyes aren’t on the trees or the pagodas. They’re on me. On me leaning against the arbor, on my long pencil skirt, on the low-cut tank top peeking out beneath my jean jacket, on my neck. “You’re not wearing your necklace today. You always wear that.”
My hand goes to my chest as I feign shock. “Oh, wow, I can’t believe I forgot that. I never do.”
“You almost done that with sandwich?” Luke peers up at the sky, squinting slightly as several drops land in quick succession on his forehead. “I think that downpour is coming sooner than we thought.”
“You afraid of getting a little wet?” I tease, wrapping half of my lunch back up and zipping it into my purse. I know he’ll eat it later.
“Are you?” I see the gleam in his eyes as he stands and my stomach explodes in a ball of flutters. Suddenly I feel like prey that’s about to be stalked, though I’m guessing Luke’s intentions are very different from that of, say, a lion stalking a gazelle.
Like a giddy teenager, I take off around the corner, weaving through the bushes and trees that I’m quite sure visitors are not allowed to touch, let alone run through. I make it all of fifteen feet before strong arms rope around my body and pull me down. Luke’s body breaks our fall.
“Well, this is kind of nice.” He peers up at the low-hanging bush that forms a thick canopy over us with a smirk. “Look at that. We’re totally hidden.” And then suddenly he has me on my back, pinning my arms down above my head with one hand. He’s right—we’re in a low-ceilinged lair, layers of broad-leaved branches cocooning us in a long, long tunnel.
Invisible to the unsuspecting eye.
The rain intensifies, and even under this protection, more and more droplets find their way between the overhang to land on us. Thank God I was smart enough to bring a nylon purse here and close it before I dropped it and took off. “Wow, it’s really coming down now. And it’s a cold rain. That can’t be good for your—”
Luke shuts me up with his mouth, shifting my thighs apart to fit against my body just right. I’m vaguely aware of the wet chill against my bare legs as Luke hikes my skirt up, until it’s pooling around my waist.
This is exactly what wasn’t supposed to happen today. But now that it’s started, I can’t stop it.
I don’t want to stop it.
“You good with this?” he whispers as he unbuckles his belt and unzips his jeans. I answer by intentionally stretching my thighs apart. The move makes him groan into our kiss, breaking free just long enough to tear the foil off a condom wrapper that he smoothly dug out from somewhere while I was writhing wantonly beneath him.
I hold my breath as fingers push my panties aside and I feel him lining himself up to slide inside me. There’s no foreplay this time and I’m okay with that. Just looking at him is foreplay right now. I haven’t stopped thinking about being with him again since—
“Hello?” a reedy female voice calls out.
Our mouths break free, and we lock wide eyes. From this vantage point, all I can spot are a pair of black-and-white polka-dot rain boots. I’m guessing the woman can’t see us. I’m hoping she couldn’t hear us. We both press our lips together and keep quiet and still as she calls out, “Hello?” again.
A long moment later, the rain boots begin shuffling down the path at an easy pace. I see my navy purse dangling next to them. “Shit, she has my camera and my phone and—” My words are cut off with a gasp as Luke pushes into me, his mouth against my ear. “Don’t worry, we’ll go get it back in a minute.”
“Only a minute?” I tease between ragged breaths. My eyes close as he fills me completely, until the raindrops don’t graze my face anymore, and the branches don’t scratch at my legs, and the cold, wet ground doesn’t touch my skin.
Until I’m consumed by the feel of Luke.
“Thank you so much. I must have set it on the bench and somehow forgot it when it started raining.” I check inside to find everything there, including half a sandwich.
“Eating is expressly forbidden in the gardens, you know.” Black-and-white polka-dot rain boots woman—the same woman who smiles and waves when I come here—now peers over her glasses at me, her tight bun making her look all the more severe.
“Oh, I know. That’s just there for later.”
“Right.” A sniff of disapproval escapes her as her eyes trail down my clothes—soaking wet. That’s fine. I was in the rain, without a proper rain jacket or umbrella. That’s what happens.
“Well, thank you for keeping it safe.” I don’t look back once as Luke and I walk hand-in-hand back to the parking lot. That’s when Luke bursts out laughing.
“It’s not that funny.” But I can’t keep the smile off my face.
“Actually it is. You should see yourself.”
“Yeah, well, you’re not looking so spectacular right now, either.” That’s a flat-out lie. Even with his hair plastered against his forehead and neck in wisps, and his shirt clinging to his body, blood still races through my limbs every time I think about touching him.
“But at least I’m not covered in dirt.” Reaching behind me, he begins picking off leaves and grass. Some twigs. “I guess rain doesn’t make everything clean, does it.”
“Shit.” I peer down at the back of my skirt. It looks like I was rolling around in mud, which is basically what I was doing. “Do you think she knew?”
He laughs. “I’m guessing she has a pretty good idea.”
“Awesome.” I shake my head but smile. “I guess I won’t be doing my next photography assignment here.”
