Ten Thousand Lies (23 page)

I liked Jaime’s hair. Long and wavy, it was the color of warm earth with streaks of golden sunlight. It smelled good, too. I had taken the secret liberty of touching it just once before Deo could get his hands on it. My fingers had teased through the silky mass, cherishing the feel of it.

It wouldn’t matter what she did. Jaime could shave her head, and I’d still adore the fuck out of her.

As I lay in my bed, my room dark and cool, my blood was flame-hot while I thought about her. As I remembered her touch on my knee that had slipped a little higher as the evening passed on, my cock grew rock hard and heavy.

I wondered what it’d be like to have her hand wrap around it.

I gripped it, squeezing tight, seeking relief from the insane pressure building up.

“Oh my God…” I groaned.

I rarely—fucking
rarely
—had a wank. The only time I had was when I’d been on the phone with Jaime. But fuck me, my sac was drawn up tight, letting me fucking know that I needed to have a wank now. Breath catching in my chest, I pulled my fist up my tingling shaft. With the pad of my thumb, I rubbed the liquid all over the head, imagining it was Jaime’s tongue.

“Fuck.”

Pushing my fist down and pulling back up, I closed my eyes and let the fantasies of my girl bombard my brain. I could almost feel her, smell her. I was desperate to taste her lips, to push into her body, knowing we were one being for even the slightest moment in time.

My orgasm hit me hard and swift. Biting the inside of my cheeks, I groaned through my nose. I wanted to shout out her name, wanted to hear her call out mine.

“Jamey…”

With a gasp, my eyes sprang open, my heart pounding like a bass drum.

I hadn’t been Jamey for six years. I was Ricki. I’d always be Ricki.

What does it matter? I am who I am.

Despite my whole life being a tapestry of ten thousand lies, what I felt for Jaime, who I was when I’d pressed her hand to my knee,
that
was genuine. That was the person I was at my core, and she was the only one who could make me feel that way.

Ricki

Ronen and I spent the early part of Sunday preparing for my trip to De L’Europe. Felicia met us at the shop and rigged my equipment with as much high-tech surveillance crap as possible. Insanely tiny microphones and cameras were installed in my machine case, my boots, and my new belt buckle.

“Crotch cam.” Ronen snickered.

“Thanks, mate,” I replied.

“Don’t wear it when you dry-hump Jaime for the first time.”

“You’re a prick.”

“No, use your prick. She’s not all hot and bothered for mine.”

After I stashed everything in the hidden vault under the rug and coffee table in my office, we made to leave the shop. Felicia snuck out the back while Ronen and I walked out the front and locked up.

“What’s your take on this shite?” I asked him.

“Like, how I feel about tomorrow?”

“Yeah.”

He was quiet for a few minutes. “I think it’s going to be all right as long as you keep up the act. You’re real cool under pressure, man. I’m never worried about you going psycho and shit on a mission, and you just need to treat this like any other.”

“True.”

I’d never admit it to him, but I wished Ronen were coming with me. I also knew he was more concerned than he was letting on, and he’d probably spend the whole time watching the live feed to make sure nothing happened to me.

We made it to Ellen’s, heading around the side along the canal and hopping the fence in the back. Jones and Jakob were still tailing us, and so far, there was no sign of the Russians or strange people following us, but it was best to be safe than sorry.

Ellen had left the back door open for us. We headed inside and met her up in her flat. She tossed a joint at Ronen, but I declined. I needed my head clear for what I would be facing. Instead, I opened the window and leaned out, sparking up a cigarette.

“You’re all set for tomorrow?” asked Ellen.

“I think so,” I replied. “I’m a little nervous. It’s not my usual type of mission.”

Ronen was quiet, but Ellen nodded.

“You’ve got this, Ricki,” she said. “You know you do. You went with your gut, and it proved to be the right move. What would normally have taken us weeks, if not months, to accomplish, you got it done within days.”

“You don’t think it was a little
too
convenient?” I asked.

Ronen’s glassy eyes looked over at me.

“No,” said Ellen. “Just a matter of right place, right time. If they suspected the two of you at all, then they’d have had you tailed from the second you left the club. So far, you’re both in the clear. Intelligence says the Russians are looking for at least two Brits, so it looks like some sort of surveillance was given to them from that mission a few years back. We’re thinking only audio; otherwise, they’d be hunting for the three of you, plus Jakob, Jones, and Belfry on top of it, and those guys don’t wear ski masks.”

I nodded.

“What is it?” she asked, giving me a strange look.

Flicking the butt of my cigarette out the window, I leaned against the wall and crossed my arms over my chest. “Jaime,” I replied quietly.

“What about her?”

Ronen giggled. “They were holding hands last night.”

Arsehole
.

Ellen’s eyebrows rose and wriggled. “Oh, yeah?”

“Nothing else has happened,” I stated. “I’m just worried about her being caught up in all of this.”

“Well, the Locals think having her at the shop is a good idea. She gives the place more credit, and an extra pair of eyes and ears isn’t a bad thing. She knows the dangers, and she’s happy to help in any way she can.”

Exhaling loudly, I didn’t realize I’d been holding my breath. “What else did you tell her yesterday?”

Ellen’s eyes crinkled as she smiled. “I told her you had the hots for her.”

I gasped. “What?”

“What? Like that’s a surprise? She held your hand last night, didn’t she?”

Ronen giggled again.

Ellen shot him a filthy look. “Get him out of here before I shoot him for irritating me.”

Ronen busted out laughing. “I love you, Ellen.”

“I love you, too, turd.”

I was feeling a little easier after talking to Ellen as we headed for the House of Bro Dawgs. Ronen gave two raps before opening the front door. Taking off our shoes, we headed inside to the sounds of ripping chain saws and screams.

The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.
No surprise there.

When Xanthe and Deo had gotten together, it was a bloodbath of movies, and that particular one was their favorite.

The sight of Jaime sitting on the floor between Deo’s knees had me yearning to go on a chain saw massacre myself. Especially since the left side of her face was resting on the inside of his left thigh as he rolled up a dreadlock on the right side of her head.

Deo looked up at us. “Hey. Everything went good?”

“He’s ready,” said Ronen, clapping me on my back and plopping down into the armchair.

Deo kept looking at me as he rolled Jaime’s hair. The concern in his eyes made me feel guilty for wanting to stab him in the face for touching her.

“It’s all good, man,” I told him.

Xanthe looked over at me and gave me a warm smile. Seated next to Deo on the couch, legs stretched out, she had her feet tucked beneath his bum. So, I did what I wanted to do, which was sit next to Jaime on the floor.

As I settled in, her slim hand reached out from behind Deo’s massive calf to touch my thigh. Clasping her hand in mine, I pulled it into my lap to tease her palm with the fingertips of my left hand.

Right now, right here, I was filled with a sense of peace. Jaime made something inside me want to let go of everything even if it was for the short amount of time I got to touch her in simplicity.

She filled me with something I had forgotten existed.

Hope.

The ceiling in my bedroom wasn’t particularly exciting, but I stared at it anyway. There were nicotine stains by the window where I usually had my morning smoke. In the dim yellow glow from my nightstand lamp, they looked dark, grungy.

I’d been lying here for over an hour, silently freaking the fuck out. I needed to sleep. My wits were what would get me through tomorrow, and they’d be sorely lacking if I were knackered on top of nervous.

For hours, Jaime and I had sat next to each other, holding hands and lightly touching one another. When we’d eaten our Indian takeout, she’d kept her leg pressed to mine. The slight pressure of her against me had kept the thought of tomorrow at bay.

Without her now, my nerves were flaring up, letting me know I had so much to lose if I mucked this up.

We hadn’t kissed good-bye. Instead, she’d walked out with us, holding my hand until I crossed the threshold. As I’d turned around, she’d let go of my hand, and I’d keenly felt the loss of her touch but gotten the full blast of her shining China blues.

“Be careful,” she’d told me.

“I will,” I’d replied.

Suddenly, the need to have her near me now knifed through me. It was painful, this separation from her. Jaime and her precious touch was a balm to my flayed and jaded soul.

On the nightstand, my phone chimed. Reaching out, I glanced at it, finding a text message from her.

Jaime: Are you awake?

A pleasant shiver tingled through me, my mouth twitching with happiness. Jaime hadn’t texted me since before she moved here.

Me: Yes.

I waited for her response, but instead, my phone rang in my hand. I stared at my pet name for her on the screen.

Dollface.

“Hello?” I answered, my voice heavy in my chest and throat.

“Hey,” came her reply.

Biting my lip, I closed my eyes and exhaled slowly. “Hey.”

“What are you doing?”

“Just lying in bed.”

“Me, too.”

“You can’t sleep either?”

“Xanthe and Deo are kind of…loud,” she drawled.

“What—oh. Yeah?”

“Mmhmm.”

“That’s, uh…” I knew Deo was mostly here to be with Xanthe, and I knew what that entailed. “Honestly, it grosses me out.”

Jaime laughed. “Why?”

Indeed, I could hear a muted thumping through the phone. Cringing, I replied, “Because they’re like my siblings, and the fact that they bang each other is bloody disturbing.”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“So, what? You heard other people having sex and decided to call me?” Then, I realized how that sounded and was well embarrassed for saying it.

“Maybe,” she replied. I could hear in her voice that she was smiling. “I was thinking about you anyway.”

“Oh, yeah?” That perked me up, and I shifted into a seated position. “What about me?”

“Just…stuff. I, um…”

Her breath caressed my ear through the phone, and I closed my eyes, my groin tightening in response.

“I guess I’m worried,” she said.

“About?”

“About what you have to do tomorrow. I don’t even know what it is, but you, Ronen, and Deo seemed nervous about it, and it made me nervous, too.”

Oddly, I was kind of disappointed. I wanted her to tell me she liked me. I needed to hear it, so I could feel it deep inside, like it had been between us before I’d gone and mucked us up.