Неизвестный - 5. Justice Served Страница 31

“Come sit down. You look tired.”

Grimacing, Rebecca shrugged out of her blazer and dropped it on a nearby chair. With one hand she released the buckle on the strap beneath her right arm that secured her holstered weapon beneath her left breast. This, too, she shed with a practiced motion and let it settle atop the rumpled jacket. With a sigh, she sank down beside Catherine, where she leaned her head back and stretched her long legs out in front of her. With one hand, she groped for Catherine’s, and Þ nding it, closed her Þ ngers around her lover’s. “Hi.”

“Hello.” Catherine angled her body and drew Rebecca’s head down against her shoulder. “Are you in for the night?”

“I wish,” Rebecca mumbled, closing her eyes.

Catherine stroked Rebecca’s hair, then the back of her neck, eliciting a soft groan. These were the moments that were hardest for her, when what she wanted most was to hold Rebecca for hours, keeping her close, restoring them both as only this quiet connection could. Instead, she needed to prepare herself for Rebecca leaving once

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again on the most dangerous kind of assignment she could undertake.

Undercover operations, as Catherine had come to learn, were notoriously unpredictable. The last one had ended with Dellon nearly bleeding to death from a stab wound. And now another night loomed when she would not know where her lover was, what danger she might be in, or what harm might already have befallen her. The ringing of the phone in the middle of those dark, lonely nights was like a death knell. She tightened her hold on Rebecca and rested her cheek against the top of the blond head.

“What’s wrong?” Rebecca murmured.

For an instant, Catherine hesitated, then realized that she could not expect Rebecca to share her uncertainties if she herself did not.

“Missing you, a little bit.”

“I’m sorry,” Rebecca said immediately, starting to straighten.

“No.” Catherine held her fast. “I don’t want you to be sorry. It’s not something for you to Þ x, darling. It’s just the way I feel.” She looked down to see Rebecca searching her face with worried eyes. She slanted her mouth across Rebecca’s, kissing her hard. She felt the instant when Rebecca’s tired body came to life, the faint tightening of her limbs, the sudden quivering of the muscles beneath her hands. Easing away from the kiss, she laughed softly. “That wasn’t exactly what I meant I was missing, but that’s part of it.”

“I’ve got six or seven hours, at least,” Rebecca responded, her voice already rough with desire.

“When you should be sleeping.”

“It’s not sleep I need. It’s just you. Just you.”

Catherine’s lips parted in soft surprise as her heart melted. “Why, when I know that you love me, does hearing you say it always make me weak with wanting?”

Rebecca grinned, her eyes alive again. “I pick my moments.”

“Your timing always has been excellent,” Catherine murmured.

There were things she wanted to say, things she wanted to ask, but those things could wait until they both took what they needed from one another. She smoothed her hand down the front of Rebecca’s shirt until she reached the slender belt that encircled her waist. As she found Rebecca’s mouth again, she slipped the thin leather through the small silver buckle and then moved on to the clasp and zipper beneath. As she licked her way into Rebecca’s mouth, her hand followed a similar path

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into the secret pleasures between Rebecca’s thighs. Rebecca moaned and sucked on her tongue, the unexpected sensation igniting the inferno that lay in wait deep inside. Waiting only for this one woman’s touch.

“Oh God,” Catherine breathed, breaking the kiss. “Here. Right here. Right now. Take your clothes off, darling.”

Rebecca leapt to her feet, already pulling loose the buttons on her shirt as Catherine wrenched off her own top, exposing her bare breasts.

Trousers followed shirt, underwear fell into the heap, and in another second, Rebecca lay between Catherine’s legs. She brought her mouth down hard on Catherine’s, sliding inside, slicking her way through the heat, probing deeply before she pushed herself up on her arms and stared desperately into Catherine’s eyes. “Don’t tell me you want to go slow. Please.”

Catherine braced both hands on Rebecca’s shoulders and pushed downward. “No. No. Hurry.”

Then Rebecca was between her thighs and Catherine arched as hot mouth met hot ß esh and she felt herself drawn into the cauldron of Rebecca’s desire. Blindly, she sought an anchor, Þ nding Rebecca’s shoulder and digging her Þ ngers into muscles tight as steel when teeth closed around the stiff, aching prominence of her clitoris. Her eyes went blind and her throat closed on a scream as passion erupted deep inside. She fought against the Þ rst wave of orgasm, wanting the urgency to build, delirious with the exquisite pleasure. When Rebecca’s tongue swept the length of her, then beat against her clitoris with a steady insistent rhythm, she lost the battle. Her breasts swelled, her belly spasmed, and sweet release eclipsed will. She found the back of Rebecca’s head with one hand and held Rebecca’s mouth against her as the climax poured forth.

“Don’t make yourself come,” Catherine gasped, still coming herself. “I want you in my mouth.”

Rebecca shuddered, desperate to come, but loath to separate from Catherine’s still-pulsing sex. She held off another few seconds until need overpowered all else, and then she reared up to straddle Catherine’s body. She gave a hoarse cry as Catherine’s hands clenched on her buttocks and Catherine’s mouth drove against her clitoris. Too close to orgasm to control her muscles, she fell forward and barely managed to brace herself with one arm against the sofa. Still, Catherine’s mouth never left her, sucking and tugging on her, driving her mad.

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“Oh Jesus, you’re going to make me come,” Rebecca groaned.

Nearly deaf with the roar of blood in her head, she barely registered Catherine’s exultant cries. She was coming, bucking and thrusting and shouting out her inÞ nite gratitude. Then she was falling, helpless and weak, and Catherine was there to catch her.

“I love you, oh, I love you,” Catherine murmured over and over, curled around Rebecca’s trembling form. “You’re in my blood, right down to the heart of me.”

“Love you too,” Rebecca muttered, struggling for breath.

Catherine laughed softly, searching on the back of the sofa for the light throw she kept there for when the evenings turned cool. She pulled it down over them and settled more comfortably on her back with Rebecca’s head nestled against her shoulder. It wasn’t their usual position, and she liked being the one to offer shelter. “Okay?”

“Oh yeah,” Rebecca sighed. “DeÞ nitely okay.”

After waiting another few moments for Rebecca’s heartbeat to slowly settle, Catherine asked quietly, “Why do you have to go out later?”

“Mitchell’s going back to Ziggie’s. Watts and I will back up again.”

Remembering the haunted look in Rebecca’s eyes when she’d Þ rst returned home, Catherine knew there was more. “You’ve learned something.”

Rebecca shifted slightly and opened her eyes to stare up at the ceiling. “Mitchell did, really. She thinks, and I agree with her, that most of the girls involved in the sex videos—and probably working a fair number of the strip clubs in the city—have been smuggled in on ships from Russia.”

“Oh my God.” Catherine turned on her side so that she was facing Rebecca, wanting to see her face. “Is that what this is all about?”

Rebecca nodded and gave her a quick summary of Mitchell’s theories. As Rebecca spoke, Catherine listened and watched. She saw the faint ß icker of Rebecca’s pupils when she talked about Trudy, heard the barest deepening of her voice that only hinted at the depth of her pain. Oh, you are so very good at hiding your sorrow.

She waited until Rebecca fell silent, until the story had been told.

Then she pressed her Þ ngertips to Rebecca’s mouth, brushing over her lips, cupping her jaw. “I’m so very sorry about Trudy, darling.”

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“Out of all of that,” Rebecca said quietly, “that’s the thing you found to talk about.”

Catherine smiled gently. “That’s the thing that hurts you most.”

Rebecca rested her forehead against Catherine’s and closed her eyes. “If she hadn’t taken Sandy to that meeting, if she hadn’t gone to that building to shoot that Þ lm, if she hadn’t been unknowingly part of my operation, she’d still be alive.”

“I’m not telling you not to care, darling. I’m not even telling you not to accept responsibility, although I don’t believe it’s all yours to bear.” Catherine stroked down Rebecca’s arm and clasped her Þ ngers.

“But you made the best decision you could with what you knew at the time, and you never would’ve put Sandy or Trudy in lethal danger if you’d thought that was likely. You cannot carry all the burden, Rebecca, or it will destroy you.”

Rebecca’s eyes ß ickered opened. “And us?”

“No,” Catherine answered immediately. “I will Þ ght you on this before I will let that happen. I will stand in front of that door over there and prevent you from going out if I have to. I will not let this job take you from me.”

“You sound pretty set on that.”

“I am.” Catherine leaned forward and kissed Rebecca lightly.

“Still ready to move in?”

“Oh yeah.” Rebecca curved an arm around Catherine’s back and pulled her tight against the length of her body. She kissed her, hard and deep. “Consider me moved in.”

Catherine laughed shakily. “I’d forgotten how quickly cops make decisions.”

“You’ll get used to it.”

“I don’t think there’s anything about loving you that I’ll ever get used to,” Catherine whispered, pillowing her cheek against Rebecca’s chest. “And that’s just Þ ne.”

“I don’t expect anything to happen tonight. You don’t have to worry.”

Catherine saw no need to tell her that whenever she worked, Catherine would worry. It was part of their life now, and it could not be changed. “Do you really think these girls were ferried across the ocean in huge metal containers?”

“I do. It all Þ ts.” Rebecca’s voice had taken on a grim tone.

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“And this kind of thing is really happening on a large scale?”

Catherine could only imagine the horror of girls being crowded together in a dark, poorly ventilated twenty-by-thirty-foot space for days, even weeks. How much these young women must long for their dream of America to endure such torture, only to Þ nd another kind of hell at the end of their nightmare journey. “God, it’s inhuman.”

“We’re just beginning to get an idea of exactly how big this business is. The recent reports I’ve read say there are dozens of active stash houses in all of the major metropolitan cities—way stations where these underage girls and young women from dozens of countries are held captive and eventually trafÞ cked.”

“They’re just—merchandise.”

Rebecca nodded. “In the worst-case scenario, they may be rented out for sex for as little as Þ fteen minutes at a time, dozens of times a day. It doesn’t take much to Þ gure out that each girl could bring in thousands every week. Christ, the CIA estimates that every year there are twenty thousand new sex slaves imported into this country alone.”

Catherine had seen and heard the worst of human behavior in her line of work, but this blatant trade in human misery was almost too horriÞ c for her to absorb. The words were out before she even realized what they meant. “You have to stop them.”

“I will.”

“Rebecca,” Catherine sighed softly, her cheek to Rebecca’s heart.

“Loving you is the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

Rebecca’s swift intake of breath cut through the silence in the room.

“I don’t want you in danger,” Catherine went on, lifting her head and holding Rebecca’s gaze. “I don’t want to lose you, not even the tiniest part of you, to this work—this crusade—that you’ve undertaken.

I couldn’t bear for you to die doing this.”

“Catherine,” Rebecca protested.

“No, listen,” Catherine said softly. “And as much as I fear those things happening, I want you to end this horror. I trust you to do it. I’m proud beyond description that you can.” She laughed unsteadily. “And that, my darling, is one hell of a conundrum.”

“Is there something I should do to make it better?” Rebecca asked seriously.

“Oh yes.”

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“What?” Rebecca carried Catherine’s hand to her lips and kissed her palm. “What?”

“Promise me to always come home.”

Rebecca never hesitated. “I promise.”

Catherine closed her eyes and settled her head back against Rebecca’s breast, as comforted as it was possible for her to be. Because Rebecca Frye always kept her promises.

v

Mitchell found Sandy in the conference room viewing video clips with Jason. They each had a lined yellow notepad covered with dates and diagrams in front of them. “Hey, how’s it going?”

“Slow,” Jason admitted, rubbing his eyes. “But we’ve got two for sure from almost a year ago.”

Sandy did not look away from the monitor, and Mitchell followed her gaze. The sound was off, making the image of a naked young woman rocking furiously astride the hips of a much older man, who lay on his back, seem nearly surreal.

“Can I talk to you for a minute, San?” Mitchell asked quietly.

“Kinda busy right now.”

Jason stood. “I could use a break. Let’s call it a night. I need to go home and catch a few hours’ sleep before we go out again.” He glanced toward Mitchell. “I’ll pick you up again, say midnight?”

Silently, Mitchell nodded, her eyes still on Sandy’s glacial countenance. She waited until Jason was gone, then rested her hand on Sandy’s shoulder. “Honey.”

Sandy swiveled on her chair and looked up, her face closed, her eyes shielded. “Did you kiss her?”

Fuck. Mitchell took a breath. “Is there a difference between me kissing her and her kissing me?”

“Not even a little.”

“Is there any room to talk about the job, and how I needed to convince her I was for real?”

Sandy folded her arms beneath her breasts, her jaws clenched tight. Mitchell’s stomach tied itself into a knot. What she hated more than the anger in Sandy’s eyes was the glimmer of hurt she couldn’t hide. That was far, far worse.

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“It didn’t mean anything,” Mitchell whispered. “It was a couple of kisses. That’s all.”

“Did she touch you?”

“Sandy, come on,” Mitchell pleaded.

“Did she?”

“Not in any way that mattered.” Mitchell’s voice was steady, solid.

“Nobody does except you.”

Mitchell waited for the eruption, expecting to be scalded, willing to be, if it would put them right. What she didn’t expect were the tears, and the sight literally brought her to her knees. “Oh fuck.” Kneeling in front of the chair, she put her arms around Sandy and pulled her against her chest. She stroked her back, kissed her forehead, brushed at the tears on her damp cheeks. “Honey, come on. Honey, don’t cry. You’re killing me.”