Surreptitious (London) (5 page)

Chapter six

Taylor

By the time we arrived at the track (I say track; it’s a road, in a circle, with no police to tell you what speed you can go.) Jackson still hadn’t spoken another word to me and it was setting me on edge because I’m not one for utter silence. He still didn’t speak a word when he slid out of the car with practised ease, he didn’t speak a word to me when he walked over to the shack to pay the fee, he didn’t speak a word to me when he looked me over and grabbed me a helmet and he STILL didn’t speak to me when he came over and put said helmet straight on my head.

His fingers grazed the skin of my neck when he bent to do up the strap and I had to force down a full-body shiver from the contact. His hands were rough and calloused but they fit him, they were large and strong and I fleetingly wondered what they would feel like on other parts of my body. I immediately shut that thought down and stepped back from him so he wouldn’t see how much he affected me.
Bad Taylor.

He slid his fingers down my arm, held my hand and led me back to the car. My feet were soaked through as I was still only wearing his socks, I didn’t know how I’d allowed him to bring take me to the track at all seeing as I was wearing clothes that were about five sizes too big for me, and made for men but the thought vanished when he literally ‘placed’ me in the car, slammed the door, walked around the front of the car, got in his own side, gave me his trademark grin and finally spoke to me.

“Ready to really move baby girl?!” WHAT THE HELL?! He spent like 15/20 minutes not talking to me, and when he decides he’s over his snit, he turns the charm straight back on again?! I threw him a scowl and said,

“Are you for real? Do you have a multiple personality disorder? You switch off when I’ve obviously said something wrong, even though I wouldn’t know what the problem was seeing as I DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT YOU AT ALL. You say you wanna get to know me, but freeze me out when you feel like it? You’ve decided that you’re over your
snit
so I have to accept it?! You gotta know Jackson, I really ain’t feelin’ playing your games.”

AGAIN he didn’t answer me exactly, but his lips twitched when I said the word ‘snit’ and he informed me that ‘men don’t have snits’ and then he said “hold on” and pressed his foot on the accelerator but didn’t release the clutch so the engine revved...
loud
. The he grinned in my direction which confused the fuck out of me even more than I already was and sped the car out onto the track.

Holy.Fucking.Shit. He was right, that car could
move
. My whole frame was plastered back into the seat and I could
feel
the force of the pressure outside as we flew...literally
flew
around the track. I couldn’t help it, my mouth did it for me, a huge grin spread across my face and a let out a small giggle before I remembered I was pissed at him.

I crossed my arms and harrumphed at him, but this had little effect on him because he just laughed under his breath and shook his head at me before a seriously mischievous look crossed his face and I braced myself for whatever he had in mind. I didn’t, however, do this quick enough seeing as he twisted the wheel and the whole vehicle skidded to the side and regardless of the fact I was wearing my seat-belt I was flung...
flung!...
right into him. He let out a full-belly laugh and kept driving while I tried to right myself back into my own seat.

“Lighten up baby girl! You love it and you know it! It’s written all over your face! Ain’t nothin’ better than the freedom of putting your foot down and flying.” He reached over and squeezed my knee, which sent sparks straight through me before saying... “well...almost nothin’.“

We drove around for about twenty minutes and I listened as he told me all about his brothers and the fact that he owned THREE clubs, one in Manchester (Ignite), one in Birmingham (Flame) and the new one here in London (Blaze)...
Hmm I’m fairly sure there’s a theme involved here!
I didn’t understand how he could own them all in different places, but only live here and he explained that because the other two are much smaller than ‘Blaze’ and that unless something drastic happens, he only visits them every three months just to make sure they’re ok but he has friends who run both of them so he never worries about them.

I had serious doubts about this because I couldn’t imagine leaving my business, a business I’m guessing took a hell of a lot of work to start, in the hands of ANYONE other than myself; then again, maybe he trusted people easier than I did.

The more time I spent with him though, I realised I actually LIKED him. He was easy to talk to, he was funny, seriously charismatic and I relaxed around him more than I ever should have. We dropped off our helmets in the shack and he said he had one more stop to make before he took me home and since I’d already spent more time with him than I ever planned to, I figured there wouldn’t be any harm going along with it.

Chapter
seven

Taylor

We arrived behind Blaze and he pulled into spot that had a sign reading ‘
Reserved – Mr Brent
’.
Jackson Brent
. I thought it was pretty egotistical that he reserved his own spot in his car-park but I didn’t comment because he was already out the car and rounding the front to come and open my door. I pushed just how good that felt into a corner of my brain and filed it away never to be looked at again and accepted his hand to help me get out. I assumed he would let go when I was standing but he didn’t, he lifted my hand, placed it on his shoulder, bent at the waist, put his forearm behind my knees and lifted me up against his chest.
OH MY GOD!! He’s carrying me...like actually...CARRYING ME
. I wasn’t sure why he was doing it, or how I even felt about it but when I opened my mouth to ask him, he jumped in first with...

“Baby girl, this is the car-park of a god damn nightclub. There’s more glass out here than there is on the fuckin’ St Mary Axe!! You haven’t even got shoes on and I don’t figure you’re a fan of having your feet shredded. So don’t bitch about it and just let me get you inside without any accidents ok?” At this I immediately snapped...

“I was NOT going to bitch about it! I was just going to ask
why
you were doing it. It wouldn’t hurt you to explain things to me before you do them you know.” That earned me another lip twitch but no response and when we reached the door I again, assumed incorrectly that he would put me down to open the door but he manoeuvred me so only one arm was resting under my ass but I held on tighter and he grabbed his keys with his free hand, unlocked the door and placed me on my feet in the entrance. I say ‘placed’ because he really did swing my legs down gently first, before holding my waist until I was steady, and then I removed my arms from around his neck. Another trait that was far too sweet so I added it to the other things I had filed away in the corner of my brain, never to be looked at again.

He headed straight for the stairs behind the paying-in desk and seeing as he didn’t tell me otherwise, I followed closely behind him.
Bad move –wow, what a great ass...grab it...NO DON’T GRAB IT...ohhh a little grab won’t hurt...ARGHH NO TAYLOR. STOP IT!!

At the top of the stairs he opened a black door that led into a room that held a bank of computer screens along the back wall. I was fascinated because they were all aimed at a different part of the club and I first thought that whoever ran security here must see some seriously funny shit!

Jackson sat in the office chair and pulled me sideways onto his lap, I stiffened at this move but he held an arm around my waist so I couldn’t move, brushed my hair over my shoulder and whispered...

“Relax baby girl.”
Relax...RELAX...um, no.

“Jackson please let me off your lap.” And YET AGAIN, he didn’t respond to what I said, he just replied...

“Call me Jax.”

“Please can you let me off your lap...
Jax
”

“Nope.”

“Nope?” I questioned

“That’s what I said. Nope. I like you where you are”

At this point I decided seeing as he was about twice my size, strength and could probably talk his way out of pretty much anything. I’d let him win this battle. This was not me giving in. Oh no, I always had a plan in place, and deep down I knew, no matter the fact that I was actually enjoying myself, not right at that precise moment, but the day in general, that once he dropped me home later, I would
politely
explain that I was grateful for him looking after me last night and taking me out in his car but I would appreciate it if I never had to see him again. Easy.
I hoped.

I was planning my farewell speech in my head when the image on the monitor caught my attention and my breath caught in my throat at the sight. Jax had found and zoomed in right on the point of the previous night when he approached me on the dance-floor.

As he came from behind me and I didn’t immediately know it was him, I was riveted to the show, completely entranced. His eyes were practically molten and he didn’t even glance at any of the other women dancing around him as he made his way straight to me. My pulse increased when I watched him place his hands on my hips and as we danced on the screen my breath was coming in short gasps and I couldn’t help my body’s reaction to the view. I pressed my thighs together and wriggled in his lap to try and ease the ache forming between my legs and I vaguely heard him grunt behind me but I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen because
DAMN
we looked
hot.

He shifted beneath me and reached forward to click fast forward, I fought down the feeling of disappointment that I didn’t get to watch the whole show and the images flew through to the point of the night that I actually really did
not
want to watch...but I didn’t verbalise my thoughts and he pressed play. It was easy to see when my night turned to shit as that
dickhead
knocked my arm and confident as all get out, just emptied a small bag into my drink, right there, in front of my face,
fucking drugging me
.

Jax had turned to stone beneath me and I twisted at the waist to look up at him. His face was scary fierce and I wasn’t sure what exactly he was so pissed about, he didn’t know me at all at the time and nothing further happened but there was an edge to him that had me worried. I leaned into him slightly and said...

“I’m okay. Nothing happened to me, you know that now” His face clenched even more and his lips formed a tight line before he grabbed his phone off the desk, took a photo of the
dickhead
who spiked my drink, punched a few buttons into his phone, put it to his ear and bit out, “Luc? Yeah, Jax...just sent you a photo. Find it. Do what you gotta do.” He listened for a few seconds before he said in a slightly less scathing tone

“You got it. Owe you” He threw his phone down on the desk before turning to me. His eyes were pained and for the first time, he looked slightly unsure of himself. When he spoke, his voice was almost broken, like a lost boy, it immediately set me on edge because I just couldn’t see this man being vulnerable in
any
way.

“I thought it was you. I blamed you for doing that to
yourself
. I’m sorry. Sorry for thinking it, and sorry for speaking to you how I did this morning.”
HOLY SHIT.
Not that I had much experience around men at all, but from what I did know, it took a hell of a lot for a man to admit when he was wrong, and even more for him to say he was sorry. Instead of replying to this, I thought of his odd phone call and asked

“Um, what were you talking about on the phone?” He rubbed his lips together as if weighing up his answer, stared at me for a few seconds and replied, “That guy? He won’t come back here again. Drugs don’t touch my places,
especially
not when the customers don’t even know they’re fucking taking ‘em and he needed a lesson. I just handed him one.”

His answer scared me. I’m loud and I’m mouthy, I threaten violence...
often
...but I’d never go through with it and I didn’t like what he was insinuating so I chose to ignore it and address the next point.

“I was over what you said this morning hours ago. You don’t need to apologise now, but I’ll take it anyway so thank you. Now, I had a shit night, a shit morning, a thrill ride around a track and I’m still wearing clothes that I shouldn’t be seen dead wearing out in public. So could you please take me home now?” His lips twitched but he shifted me off his lap and stood up.

“Sure baby girl, I can do that.”

Chapter eight

Taylor

The following day, my luck really did not get any better. I had been in a foul mood all day, mainly because I couldn’t stop thinking about the day before.

After I asked Jax to take me home, he carried me to car
again,
but as I’d already decided I’d never be seeing him again I wasn’t gonna fight it! I took note of just how nice it felt to be held against his chest and locked it away with the other nice things he’d done, never to be looked at again and
forgot
about it. I was definitely not thinking about it every few minutes and picturing what it would be like to be held like that again. No, I wouldn’t think things like that.

All thoughts of this quickly fled when he again did
not
take me straight home, but instead drove to the nearest drive-thru and ordered enough food for about seven people. Did he listen when I told him I wasn’t hungry and just wanted to go home? Nope. He just raised an eye-brow at me and said “Babe!”

...That’s it! Just...
babe?!
I scowled at him and grabbed some fries anyway, because I was hungry. I just didn’t want him to know that.

He pulled up outside the gates of my complex and stared at me expectantly, seeing as I had no idea what he was waiting for I just raised my had in a small wave and lent to get out of the car but he halted me as soon as I opened the door. He grabbed my wrist and said “Babe, what’s the code?”

“The code?”

“Yeah, the code, to open the gates?”

A thousand thoughts raced through my mind, the main one being OH MY GOD, HE THINKS HE’S COMING IN?! So I asked quietly,

“Did I invite you in?” And he barked out a short laugh before saying

“No baby girl, I’m not coming in, I got shit to do, but a gentleman walks his lady to the door at the end of the date.”

“Whoa, this was not a date, I don’t need you to be gentleman, because I’m not, nor will I ever be your lady.”
Jeez who the hell does he think he is?!
He muttered something under his breath that I thought was ‘fuckin’ games’ but I wasn’t sure, before he said

“I took you out to the track, I bought you dinner and I brought you home. Date.”

“You showed me how fast your car could go, you bought me burgers and fries that I did
not
ask for and you gave me a
lift
home because I asked you for a favour...over four hours ago!...NOT a date.”

Instead of answering me, he leaned forward and placed his lips on mine. I was so shocked at this move, my entire body froze and my mouth parted slightly on a gasp. He stroked the side of my face at the same time, he touched the tip of his tongue to mine and then pulled back and said “Ok baby girl, I’ll be in touch.”

I didn’t think myself capable of forming a full sentence but I croaked out “I don’t ever want to see you again” and ran...literally
ran
from the car, through the side gate and to the elevators. I didn’t start breathing again properly until I slammed the door to my apartment. Then I managed to screw up my normal breathing by sliding down the door and bursting into tears...FUCK.

Okay so this might confuse the hell out of most people seeing as I had spent the day with my Mr Gorgeous, some bits were bad, some bits were good and some bits were really
really
good. But I’ll never get involved with anyone again, people can’t be trusted, men break hearts and I can’t, I WON’T put myself through it ever again.

See...I had my first boyfriend when I was seventeen. Matthew Grier. I loved him, like I,
really
loved him. He was twenty and he had a nice car, nice apartment, nice clothes, hair, body, nice everything. I doted on him and he doted on me. He bought me little gifts almost every time we’d meet; he’d brush my hair behind my ear and tell me how ‘hot’ I was. At the time, I thought ‘you’re so hot’ was the best compliment anyone could ever give me. I was blindsided by that shit.

My dad hated him, seriously hated him, he wasn’t allowed to come to our house, he wasn’t allowed near my parents shop when I was working and my dad would turn his eyes away in an unconcealed show of disapproval anytime my phone buzzed with a text from him. But I was seventeen, he was my first love and dads are not supposed to love their seventeen year old daughters older boyfriend, or so I figured.

We’d been together six months when IT happened. He was my ‘first’, yeah I gave him my virginity, though when it was happening, I couldn’t help but feel more like he was
taking
it, rather than me giving it. It wasn’t sweet, it wasn’t nice and it hurt. A lot. For those three minutes, that’s right...THREE minutes, I felt like I was in bed with a stranger and I hated every second of it. Afterwards he took me home, parked at the end of the driveway and kissed me.

Normally I melted into his kisses and held on for the ride but this kiss was wrong. Everything about it felt wrong, too much tongue, too much teeth (not that ANY teeth bashing is ever a good thing), too much
spit...
just wrong. I pulled away, told him I’d call him the next day and walked into the house.

The following day was the day my world as I knew it ended. I woke up at half ten and the house was silent so I figured my mum and dad had gone to the shop together. I followed my usual morning routine; use toilet, quick shower, throw hair up in a scruffy knot on my head, brush teeth and head downstairs. There was a note on the kitchen side that read:

Tay,

Went with your dad to the shop because there’s a big

order coming in today so lots to get done.

We’ll both be home around half 4 if everything goes to plan.

Love you to the stars and back

Mum xxx

I
adored
my mum. She was my world, my mother, my sister, my best-friend, just...my everything. We went shopping together, we went to the gym together, we baked together, watched TV together. EVERYTHING. I looked just like her and she was truly beautiful, a natural beauty, a pure beauty. She didn’t wear make-up except a swipe of mascara on each set of lashes every morning and she always looked put-together well. I envied her, but not in a bad way, in the way that I knew, no matter where it was, or what I was doing, I wanted to be exactly like her.

My dad was harder to be close to, he moved from Italy when he married my mum and he wasn’t distant as such, he just didn’t trust anyone, no one at all. Everyone had an agenda according to him so he didn’t have friends, he didn’t understand why I did and because of this, we never really had anything in common, but I still loved him.

I found it hard to understand how he ever even managed to marry my mum, his entire world was about art and antiques, I guess you could say he was a bit of a recluse except for his work, but we worked around his quirks anyway. There’d be times when my dad would start ranting about something or nothing and my mum would just raise an eye-brow at me and I’d lower my eyes and stifle a giggle. Did I mention that I adored my mum?!

Anyway...on this morning, I grabbed myself a banana and my Ipod and was planning to walk the three miles to the shop to help out my parents seeing as I had nothing better to do when I heard a knock at the door. I frowned because no one ever showed up at our door unannounced but I glanced out the front window and seen two police officers standing on the front step wearing unreadable expressions. My skin broke out in goose-bumps and I ran to the front door, opened it and said...

“Can I help you?” They looked me up and down and the elder one of the two replied

“Are you Miss Taylor Corsi?” His tone was flat and wary and it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. I told them I was, opened the door, stepped aside and asked them to come in.

Now most of what happened next is blurry, mostly I assumed because I’ve tried to block it out but the memory never fully fades.

They sat on the sofa with grim faces and told me that I should probably sit down. I can remember trembling straight away but my body had gone on auto-pilot so I did what they said and sat down opposite them. The younger police officer took a deep breath and said that there had been a ‘botched armed-robbery attempt’ at my parents shop. He paused, I think maybe to let the news to sink in, but I’d gone blank, completely blank. He then leaned forward and said,

“I’m really sorry to have to tell you this, so so sorry, but both your parents have been shot. Your father was dead when we got to the scene and your mother was pronounced dead upon arrival at the hospital”

I didn’t understand. My brain held a whole load of
nothing
, I couldn’t feel, I couldn’t hear, I don’t even think I was breathing. I didn’t say a word. Gone? Both of them? I blinked at both offices a few times...then I passed out.

I woke up in hospital the next day a different person. I was closed off, wouldn’t speak to people and I didn’t cry. EVER. I didn’t organise for my parents to have funerals because they didn’t have anyone to attend, so they were just cremated and I had their ashes put in the same urn, which I still have. Now you would think that it wouldn’t, or even couldn’t, get much worse than that...It did.

Two days after the cremations, I was still sat crossed legged on sofa, staring at the TV wondering what the hell I was going to do with my life when I heard another knock at the door. I automatically flinched at the sound because I now
hated
that door. As far as I was concerned, If I hadn’t had opened that door, then it wouldn’t have all become real, and I’d still have my parents. It was ridiculous, I knew that, still felt it though. But I got up, opened it and was standing in front of the same two police officers. Before I could speak the younger officer (D.C Clark, I later found out) addressed me.

“Sorry to interrupt you miss...”
Interrupt what exactly?!
“But we’ve made a breakthrough in our investigation and we’d like you to take a look at some photos for us to see if you recognise any of them. Would that be okay with you?” Since I didn’t really have a choice I just nodded and walked them through to the kitchen.

D.C Clark opened a black folder in front of me and laid out four mug-shots in front of me and for the second time in as many weeks, my lungs stopped working, my throat felt like it had closed up and my mouth went bone dry. I stared at the photos of me trying to figure out what the hell had gone on in my life.

“Do you know or recognise any of these men?” Two of the men I had never seen before but it was the other two that caught my attention. I glanced up at the offices and back down to the pictures and nodded. I didn’t trust my voice so I just pointed to the two men I recognised. Two men that I
knew,
or at least I thought I had.

“Could you tell us how you know these men, please miss?” I cleared my throat and shook my head to try and clear it before explaining.

“Those men? Yes, um, that one...” I pointed to the photo of the blonde haired, blue eyed skinny guy on the end and carried on...”is Jamie Grier, I don’t know him as such but he’s the uncle of this guy...” I moved my hand to the other one and ran my finger across the glossy image before shaking my head again...”This guy is...um...wow, I can’t believe I’m going to say this but um...that’s my...my b-boyfriend Matthew Grier.”

The officers glanced at each other and both wore matching troubled looks before it cleared and they turned their attention back to me and the other officer, D.C Hart, cleared his throat and explained to me just why my situation was even worse than I first thought.

“I really hate to be the bearer of bad news again miss, but you’re right, these men are Jamie and Matthew Grier, the other two whom you said you did not recognise are Giuseppe Milano and César Garcia. Three of whom are international art thieves, wanted across four different countries in Europe. We think, from what the evidence suggests, that Matthew was recruited specifically for this mission and his job was to get close to you as possible as to retrieve specific information about paintings that this group have been seeking for a number of years.” He paused and D.C Clark filled me in on the rest of the
fucking
sordid tale.

“We know this must come as a bit of a shock to you, but Mr Grier, Matthew, has cooperated fully with our investigation and we now believe we have enough evidence for a full conviction on multiple counts of theft, breaking and entering, armed robbery, assault, grievous bodily harm and for Jamie Grier...um...first degree murder. I’m sorry that the situation has come to this, but at least now you know that justice will be done for you and for your parents”

I still couldn’t speak, my first boyfriend, the boyfriend that my dad
hated
, the one he didn’t trust, the same
fucking
boyfriend who had just a couple of weeks before, taken my virginity in the flat that he lived in with his
fucking
uncle. It didn’t make sense, was I that stupid? How could I not have known something like that was going on?