Tied to the Stern Read online

  “And I wouldn’t ask you to,” Natasha said. “In fact, the way you handled yourself is a big part of the reason as to why I’m here. It’s a big part of the reason I was allowed to offer you this opportunity.”

  “Opportunity?” I asked, knowing there was no way that even Natasha Rayne was big-headed enough to refer to speaking to her as an opportunity. “What do you mean?”

  “Al Davidson was working his way up through the rings for a crime boss known as The Archer,” Natasha Rayne said. “We don’t know anything about The Archer, other than the fact that he seems to be newly minted and that no one in my very extensive and varied list of contacts knows anything about him.” She shrugged. “Also, he seems to be responsible for at least a fifth of the new drug traffic on the East Coast.”

  “What?” I balked, my eyes widening. “My God. Are you serious?”

  “I wish I wasn’t,” Natasha lamented. “The truth is, whoever this guy is, he’s good. I can’t find anyone willing to turn on him, including Al Davidson.”

  “You talked to him about it?” I asked, narrowing my eyes. “I’m guessing that’s why you didn’t see me sooner.”

  “Yeah,” Natasha answered. “I was trying to turn the piece of trash, but no luck. I didn’t think there would be. Al Davidson isn’t the type to turn informant. He’s been through too much for that. Besides, if I’m right about this-and I usually am- The Archer is the kind of boss you don’t survive being fickle with. Davidson knows that. That’s why we were going to watch him, uninhibited, until this weekend.”

  “This weekend?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest. “What happens this weekend?”

  “A get together,” Natasha answered. “A first for The Archer, so far as we can tell. A lot of his mid to higher level dealers will be meeting on St. Thomas Island for what can only be described as an initiation. It’s under the guise of a party, but from what we can tell, all those who have been invited to it have also been invited to move up the ladder, so to speak. It’s the next level of service to The Archer, and the only place we know for sure that he’s going to be.”

  “So, why not just go over and get him?” I asked, staring at the woman.

  “Other than the fact that we have no idea what he looks like?” Nat asked. “The Archer is skiddish. He’s expecting Al Davidson, and if he doesn’t show, there’s no guarantee the soiree will even still go on. My guess is that The Archer will pack up shop and disappear into the wind before we even have a chance to lay the first eyes on him.”

  “That’s why you were watching,” I said. “And I screwed it up for you. In an effort to get the drugs out of my city, I stopped you from being able to cut it off at the source.”

  “Don’t beat yourself up,” Nat said. “You didn’t have all the information.”

  “And whose fault is that?” I asked, looking over at her.

  “You want to fight with the US government’s chain of intel, then write a letter to your congressman,” Nat said. “But, if you want to help matters, then listen up.” She took a step toward me. “You remember that night back in Chicago when we ate that really spicy Indian food, and you had to go to the hospital?”

  I blanched, thinking back on the night. “I didn’t have to go to the hospital because of the food. I had to go to have my appendix removed. The food was just an unfortunate coincidence.” I shook my head. “I told you we should have just gotten ribs and been done with it.”

  “And do you remember the doctor who performed the surgery, how shaky his hands were?” Natasha asked.

  “I do. I mean, I was unconscious, but I have the souvenir to prove it,” I said, instinctively touching my side and the scar that still ran across it.

  “The scar you have,” she said, smiling a little, though it was more of a reminiscent thing than joyful. “It’s crooked.”

  “What are you getting at?” I asked.

  “That happens more than you would think,” Nat said. “Not a lot, but some. It happened to another man the same year it happened to you. A man went in to have his appendix removed and left the hospital with a crooked scar that looks almost identical to the one that runs across your body right now.”

  “Oh my God,” I muttered, piecing together the intent behind what she was saying. “The Archer has never met Al Davidson, has he?”

  “As far as we can tell, he has no idea what the man looks like,” Nat said. “But he does know about the operation he had the same year you had yours. He knows about the crooked scar, and he knows about just how much it should be healed over by now. Al Davidson is close enough to your height, weight, and coloring that you could pass for him. And, with the unique scar, there’s very little chance you’ll be questioned any further.” Natasha shook her head. “Add the fact that you’re a kickass police detective who doesn’t back down from a fight and has proven himself, not only in the field but also with me, and you’re our only shot at keeping this mission a go.” She took yet another step forward. “So, what do you say, Dillon Storm, would you like to go to St. Thomas and take down a drug ring with me?”

  “With you?” I asked, narrowing my eyes.

  “Of course, Stormy,” she answered, winking at me. “Even Al Davidson gets to bring a date.”

  Chapter 4

  “I need you to say something,” I said, looking across the living room at my wife and trying to read her face. Rebecca and I had been married for a little while now, and we were still as close as ever. Of course, that didn’t mean I knew everything about her. She was a private woman, even from me sometimes. And that meant that there were instances where I couldn’t tell what she was thinking or how she was reacting to something. Unfortunately for me, now was one of those times.

  “What do you want me to say?” my wife asked, running a hand through her dark hair and looking away from me. “It’s your job, Dillon. I get it. You have to do what you have to do. I’m not going to stand in the way of that.” She shook her head. “Even if that means you have to go to paradise and pretend to be married to your ex-girlfriend.”

  “We’re not pretending to be married,” I said. “We’re just pretending to be dating.”

  “Oh, that’s so much better,” Rebecca moaned unenthusiastically, holding up her left hand. “At least that means I don’t have to give her my ring again.”

  “No one ever gave her that ring. She stole it,” I clarified. “And the only hand I ever want to see it on is yours.” I moved closer, sitting on the couch. “Come here. Sit next to me.”

  “I have stuff to do, Dillon,” she said, shaking her head. “I have to be at work in an hour, and I still need to clean the kitchen.”

  “I’ll clean the kitchen.” I answered.

  “I’d just have to clean it again if you did,” she answered, sighing.

  “Then screw the kitchen. Let it stay dirty,” I answered. “We need to talk, Rebecca. I know things have been hard lately. I get it. You know what that means? It means that my first priority isn’t some mission on St. Thomas. It means it’s not some drug kingpin or even stopping a full fifth of the new drugs on the East Coast from coming in. My first priority is you, and, if after everything, you don’t feel like this is a good time for me to go away, I won’t go away. It really is as simple as that.”

  “What good would that do, Dillon?” Rebecca asked, staring at me with sad, if resolved, eyes. “I mean, I appreciate you offering. I really do, but you staying here isn’t going to solve our problem. I honestly don’t know what would.”

  “Rebecca, we’ve been trying for six months. That’s not a very long time,” I said.

  “It is for me,” she answered. “It is for my family.” I knew what she was about to say. It was the same spill I’d heard for months now, the same thing I was trying to avoid hearing again today. No such luck. “My mother got pregnant a few weeks after she and my dad got married. All of my cousins got pregnant really quickly, too.” She pursed her lips. “Besides, you’re acting like we haven’t been to the doctor. I’ve had the check-up,
Dillon. We both know what the problem is. I have an inhospitable womb.”

  “So what?” I asked, standing up once I realized she wasn’t going to come and sit next to me. “That doesn’t mean anything. Most people probably don’t even know what that means.”

  “Most people don’t know what dark matter is either, but that doesn’t mean it’s not important,” she said. “And the point is that I know what it is, and I know what it means.” She sighed heavily again. “We could try forever, and the likelihood is that we’ll never have a baby, DIllon.” She swallowed hard. “And it’s my fault.”

  “It is not your fault!” I said quickly and loudly. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “Maybe not,” she answered. “But I’m the problem here. You could have children if you wanted to, and I know you want to. I see the way you are around Isaac. That boy is your whole world, and your his, too. I want you to have that in your life, in a child of your own. I’m just not sure I can ever give that to you.”

  “Stop talking like that. Stop thinking like that. You think that matters to me? Do you think it would ever make a difference? Don’t you get it?” I asked, blinking hard and trying to keep the hitch out of my voice. “There is no me without you. There hasn’t been since we took those vows. If you can’t have kids, then I can’t have kids. That’s all there is to it. And yeah, it’s not the way I envisioned my life looking, but you know what? It’s okay. It’s fine, and it’s all because I’ll still have you.”

  “Am I worth that, Dillon?” Rebecca asked, and there was more pain in the woman’s voice than I had ever heard in all the time I’d known her.

  “Is that a trick question?” I asked honestly. “Of course, you’re worth it. You’re worth all of it and more. Look, I know we haven’t talked about it, but there are other ways to have kids. There are other things we could do. We could adopt or get a surrogate.”

  “None of those are guaranteed,” Rebecca answered. “We both have demanding and frankly dangerous jobs. I can’t imagine an adoption agency would look at that and think very highly of it, and surrogacy is extremely expensive and only effective a small portion of the time. The truth of the matter is, there’s a good chance it’ll just be you and me.”

  “And that’s fine,” I answered.

  “You deserve better than fine,” Rebecca said.

  “I have you,” I answered. “I have the best.”

  My wife shook her head hard, and I could see the tears welling up in her eyes. “You don’t get it,” she said. “You’re not a woman. You couldn’t understand. This is what I was born to do. It is, quite literally, what I was made for. Not being able to do it, it makes me less of a-”

  “Don’t you dare finish that sentence,” I answered. “You’re the strongest, most capable person I’ve ever met in my life. There is no one on this earth I would trust more than I trust you. You’re not less of anything. You are mine, and God willing, you always will be. You know that, right? You know that, children or no children, I’m always going to be here for you.”

  “I do,” she answered, nodding firmly. She rushed closer, throwing her arms around me. “Of course, I know that,” she said into my shoulder. “I’m just being stupid. That’s all, and I think you should go. Do what you need to do. I’m not threatened by Natasha Rayne. If she was any kind of woman, she’d have never let you go in the first place. Besides, I trust you more than anyone else in the world, too. I think you need to go handle your business. And, when you get back, we’ll keep trying to handle our business, too.” She pulled away, smiling as she leaned up and kissed me. “We might not ever get to have children, but the attempts sure can be fun.”

  Chapter 5

  “Just follow my lead, okay?” Natasha Rayne said to me as we walked into the precinct toward Boomer’s office. I had never, not even once, been nervous to walk into the office of my boss and best friend Police Chief Boomer Anderson. We had known each other since we were kids, after all. He was the closest thing I’d ever have to a brother, my half-brother notwithstanding. Still, I wasn’t coming to meet Boomer in his office today. In fact, today, I was meeting someone very different.

  Today, I was set to be briefed on the mission I was about to embark on with Natasha. I was going to get temporary clearance and be given all the details about the Archer as well as everything I needed to know about where we were going and what we would be expected to do when we got there. Plus, if Natasha was to be believed, it wouldn’t be a cakewalk.

  I was no ‘wet behind the ears’ rookie, though. I had been through my share of ordeals, and I came out of all of them relatively successfully. Hell, that was part of the reason I had been picked for this mission. Well, that and the weird surgery scar I had going for me.

  “I know what I’m doing, Nat,” I answered. “This will be fine. I can handle it.”

  “It isn’t what I’m worried about,” my ex-girlfriend said instantly. “I wouldn’t have suggested you for this mission if I didn’t think you were capable of pulling it off. It’s my boss. He’s not exactly excited about the idea of bringing someone on board who has never worked with us before.”

  “That’s not exactly true,” I answered, shaking my head. “Remember back in Vero Beach? I worked with you guys then, and I think we can all say everything worked out just fine.”

  “You’ll find out that ‘just fine’ is a relative term when it comes to the federal government,” Natasha answered. “Just do me a favor, and try not to bring up Vero Beach or any of the stuff that happened there.” She stopped short and turned back to me. “Actually, try not to bring up anything at all, okay?” She narrowed her eyes. “You know what? It’s probably better for everyone if you just let me do all the talking.”

  I glared at the woman for a long moment, wondering what on earth would make her think I needed to be coddled like a child. I might not work for the feds, but I was damn good at what I did. I was a success story, and I wasn’t going to be treated as less just because I decided to stay local and help the people and the place that meant the most to me.

  “I’m not new at this, Nat,” I answered, smiling in order to keep this light and merry. Though we were going to be going into some dodgy territory together, I saw no need in allowing the past to color our working relationship. Natasha might have burned me back in Chicago, but I had moved on from that. I was a married man now, and a happy one at that. If we were going to be working together closely, then it was in both of our best interests to act like the professional grownups we were, and that meant trusting I could deal with whatever her boss was about to throw at me. Besides, he must have signed off on me in order for me to be offered this position. How bad could it possibly be?

  “Is his ‘scar boy’?” a tall man with a head full of shaggy red locks and a dusting of a beard across his cheeks asked as Natasha and I walked into Boomer’s office and closed the door behind us. My friend and boss was nowhere to be found, which didn’t surprise me. After all, he didn’t have clearance for the information we were about to be given.

  “My name is DIllon Storm,” I answered, blinking hard, ignoring the name he’d just called me, and offering my hand to shake. He did not accept it.

  “I know your name,” the man responded, turning from me and taking a seat at Boomer’s desk. “I know a lot of names, though. After awhile, it just gets easier to refer to people as what you remember them by, as their most important aspect. That scar got you this mission. So, that’s what I’ll be calling you. You got a problem with that?”

  “Would it matter if I did?” I asked, honestly curious.

  “Probably not. No,” the man responded. “But I do like the direction your mind is going in.” He looked over at Natasha. “Maybe he won’t be as hard to whip into shape as I assumed.”

  “We can always hope, Merriman,” Natasha said, her lips curling up into a smirk. Looking at me, she motioned to the red haired man. “This is John Merriman. He’ll be our handler for this whole shebang.”

  “Good to meet you,
sir,” I said, turning to the man and nodding.

  “Right. Well, I’m hoping that, when all of this is done, I’ll be able to say the same to you,” Merriman muttered. “Maybe, when all of this is in the books, you can go from being ‘scar boy’ to ‘not totally useless scar boy’.”

  “A guy has to have a dream, I suppose,” I answered, looking from Merriman to Natasha and back again. “Why don’t you tell me what we’ll be doing here, sir?”

  “That’s a short conversation,” Merriman answered. “You’ll be doing exactly as I say. Nothing more, nothing less.” He shook his head. “I’ve read your files and all your reports. I can see that you have a knack for complicating things. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, seeing as how you complicated the hell out the Davidson thing in the first place.”

  “I was just doing my job, sir,” I answered.

  “Yeah. You always seem to just be doing your job,” Merriman said. “Doing your job is what leads you to blowing up churches and being forced to dig your brother out of unmarked graves.”

  “To be fair,” I started, remembering all of that as though it was a waves drifting back further into the shores of my mind. “I’m not technically the person who blew that church up.”

  “You must be brimming with pride,” Merriman muttered in reply. “The point is, you go off the rails. You follow your own drummer, and though you do see results more often than not, I’m afraid that just won’t work for a job like this. We’re the big boys, scar boy. We follow the rules, right down to the letter, or else someone dies. That’s what happens here.”

  “Are you sure you picked the right woman to be at my side then?” I asked, my eyes darting back to Natasha.

  “You don’t need to worry about Rayne,” Merriman answered. “I’m not, and that says a lot, certainly a lot more than I can say for you at this point.” He nodded at her. “That woman has earned her stripes a few times over in my book.” He looked back at me. “You, on the other hand, have not. From what I can tell, you’re hot headed, egotistical, and you think you know better than everybody else.”