27. Brie

CHAPTER 27

Brie

I slam the car door shut when I get out at the Solara house, and I'm grateful for the cool night air whispering across my skin, carrying with it the scent of desert sand. I'm so relieved to be back here.

I'm so relieved to be alive .

Nik was the only thing that kept me from completely losing it back there. Her warmth, her strength…

She's become such an important part of my life in so short a time.

And now Nik is the first to put herself in potential danger once more. She unlocks the door with the key she takes from me, and then she makes Holden and me wait there in the foyer while she does a sweep of the house.

I haven't said a word to Holden the whole drive over, and he hasn't spoken to me, either. But he does now. "Brie…what the hell is going on?" he asks, his voice trembling.

"Someone set me up. I guess maybe when they couldn't kill me via a hit-for-hire, they tried to get the Family to do it for them instead." I feel a pang of guilt for dragging Holden into this mess. But there's no time for coddling him.

Besides, Nik has returned, her face calm. "We're alone."

And then we stand there, the three of us, looking at each other. The silence stretches until I feel an overwhelming sense of guilt, despite the fact that…

"I'm innocent," I say, my voice sounding small.

Nik reaches out to put a hand on my shoulder, squeezing gently. "We know."

"Yeah," Holden says quickly. "Of course you're innocent. Someone must have set you up, like you said."

"That's exactly what must have happened," Nik says, but she's still looking at me so intently that I wonder what she's thinking.

But then she lets me go and turns to Holden. "Please tell me you took the footage with you."

For the first time, he grins. "Of course I did." He holds up a flash drive, tapping it against his temple. "I also stored all the different filter passes I made on the original file online. I can keep working on it, right from where I left off. In fact, if Frank hadn't jumped to conclusions, I'm pretty sure I would have found another layer under that picture of Brie."

I grab Holden's arm and drag him toward the home security office. "You need to get on it, right now. There has to be something we missed."

The security office is a testament to Terry's paranoia. Multiple screens line one wall, connected to a state-of-the-art computer system that would make most tech companies green with envy. As Holden boots the security footage up, I can't help but think of Terry. He might have been a bastard in many ways, but he knew how to prepare for the worst.

"Holden, you need to work your magic," I say, gesturing to the main screen where the damning security footage is now cued up. "There has to be something you can do to prove I wasn't there that night."

Holden slides into the chair and gets to work. Nik leaves us there with a promise to keep the door locked, saying only that she'll be right back. "So," Holden says, oh-so-casually, after the door closes behind her. "You and the bodyguard. When exactly did that start?" I give a surprised, awkward laugh, and he shoots me a smile. "I'm happy for you," he tells me. "We all deserve love."

"Whoa," I say, startled. "Let's not, uh. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. I've only known her a few days." It only feels like forever.

"I knew it was love the second I met Terry," he counters, his eyes misting over for a moment. He sniffs, blinks, and smiles again. "And I can see the way she looks at you, Brie, and the way you look at her. Maybe you're not ready to admit it yet—but you're on the way. I'm glad for both of you."

I'm saved from having to reply by Nik's return, and can only hope she doesn't ask why I've turned bright pink since she left.

"I've added some booby traps to the external doors," she says. "But we should stay alert. The Colombo goons might not be the sharpest, but the Syndicate have enough resources that they might be able to track us down."

I nod, feeling a rush of gratitude toward her. "Thank you," I say softly, meeting her eyes. For a moment, I see a flicker of something that makes my heart skip before her professional mask slips back into place. In this world of money and power, I think I've found something uniquely precious in Nik. And I can't help thinking about what Holden said. The way she looks at me…

Nik clears her throat and moves to stand behind Holden. "So what have we got?"

"I was breaking it down frame by frame when Frank interrupted me back at the casino," Holden mutters, his fingers flying over the keyboard. "And now I want to go deeper. If there's anything hinky about this footage, I'll find it."

We watch in tense silence as Holden works, the image on the screen flickering as he isolates different sections of the video. My stomach churns as I watch my reflection appear in the glass of the picture frame again, and then Holden keeps layering and filtering, bringing in more and more detail.

It's surreal, seeing this doppelg?nger wearing my face, wearing my clothes. If I didn't know for sure that I was at the Secret Garden that night, I might even be questioning my own innocence.

Is this how easily a life can be destroyed? With a few minutes of cleverly edited video?

"Wait," Nik says suddenly, leaning closer to the screen. "Brie, before the murder, when was the last time you wore that particular dress? It's the same one you wore at the Secret Garden."

"What garden?" Holden asks, looking between us in confusion.

"It's a lesbian club," I tell him distractedly, trying to remember. It's hard to think straight with Nik so close, with the weight of accusation hanging over my head, and with the fact that I have a lot of clothes. Terry liked me to be a symbol of his endless wealth. "I don't know, I—" And then it hits me. "A few nights before Terry's murder," I say slowly. "I went in to remind him he had a meeting with the head of the Gatto Family that night. I remember then, he told me I looked like a flapper. Said it was…cute."

My eyes well up with tears that I blink away in annoyance. This isn't the time for sentimentality. And then it hits me, what it means.

"Son of a bitch ," I breathe. "They must have spliced the footage in from that night."

"That's exactly what they did," Holden says grimly. "Now that I know what I'm looking for, I can see where it's not perfect," Holden finishes, zooming in on a particular section. "See here? The lighting's off. And the way she moves…it's slightly jerky. Like they had to stitch together a few clips to make sure whoever they were covering up was covered."

I feel a rush of relief so strong it makes me dizzy. "So I'm in the clear," I say, sagging against the desk.

"Not quite," Nik says, her voice grim. She places a hand on my shoulder, and I resist the urge to lean into her touch. "We still don't know who was in the original video—or why they're trying to frame you ."

The euphoria fades as quickly as it came, replaced by a cold dread that settles in my gut. "Who would have access to both sets of footage?" I wonder aloud, my mind whirling through possibilities, each more terrifying than the last.

"Anyone in casino security," Holden suggests, his brow furrowed in concentration. "Or higher-level staff who wouldn't be questioned if they went in there."

"Like Phil or Sophie," I say. "Or…anyone in the Family," I finish, despair washing over me. "Any one of them could have said they were there on orders, and no one would question them."

Nik straightens up, stretching her neck and back. "I think we've done all we can do tonight," she says diplomatically. "Let's call it here and get some shuteye. Might as well sleep while we can. Tomorrow we'll keep working on this."

She's right. I'm crashing hard after all the terror from before, and Holden's eyes are drooping. "Let's go to bed. Holden, seriously—just leave it for tonight."

We leave Holden mumbling that he'll just do a few more minutes, and Nik follows me to the bedroom after doing what she calls "a sweep of the perimeter." I'm so exhausted I just nod and sink onto the bed. When Nik comes back a few minutes later and sees me sitting there in the same position I was when she left, something changes in her face.

"I don't want you to worry—" she begins softly.

"—my pretty little head?" I finish bitterly. "You sound like Frank." I glance up at her, immediately regretting what I've just said. "Sorry. That wasn't fair."

She joins me on the bed and puts her hand in mine. "I'm sorry, too. I didn't mean to patronize you. I just meant—well, that you can trust that I have your back. You concentrate on everything else."

I lean into her and put my head on her shoulder. "This feels nice," I say in a small voice.

"Yeah."

For a few minutes we sit there, breathing together, and I try to allow myself to trust her. Let myself believe that she really will keep me safe from the Colombos and the Syndicate, just like she's kept me safe every other time.

I turn to face her. In this moment, stripped of all pretense, I feel naked under her gaze. "Can I really trust you?" I ask, echoing the question I posed to her what feels like a lifetime ago.

For a long moment, Nik is silent, her blue eyes unreadable. I hold my breath, suddenly certain that everything hinges on her answer. Then, slowly, deliberately, she nods. "Yes," she says simply. "You can trust me, Brie."

The weight of her words, the intensity of them, makes my breath catch. Maybe it's true. Maybe I'm not alone in this mess. Maybe in Nik, I've found not just a protector or a lover, but a true partner.

Someone who sees past the masks and the lies to the real me underneath.

I reach out, drawing her in for a soft, sensual kiss, need pulsing through me. And then I press my forehead to hers and whisper, "I want you."

For a long moment I think she's going to tell me we should get some rest, that I'm not making good choices, that I should see how I feel in the morning?—

And then she pushes me back on the bed and crawls over me. "I want you, too, Brie Colombo," she tells me seriously. And then, with a wicked grin, she straddles me. "And I intend to have you."