Chapter 20

Ned delivered her to the hospital—which was in Manhattan—about twenty minutes after he picked her up. The one bonus of three a.m. emergency trips was no traffic, it seemed.

She made her way to the emergency department at a jog. She'd sent Mal several texts on the journey in but he hadn't replied to any of them. She really was going to smack him when she saw him.

When she asked for Marly Eddison, the nurse gave her an odd look. "She's in Treatment Room One. Just down the hall. Are there going to be any more of you?"

"How many of us are there already?" Raina asked distractedly.

"At least four. Maybe five. I lost track," the nurse said. "Is she some sort of celebrity?"

"She's a Saint," Raina said with a grin. "We stick together."

She left the desk and found her way to the treatment room. When she knocked, she heard Marly say, "Oh Lord, who else did you call, Mal?"

The worry in her stomach eased a little. If she was talking, then Marly couldn't be too badly hurt. Then it clenched again when she realized she was about to walk into a room that had Mal in it.

"It's me," she said as she pushed the door open.

Marly was sitting on the end of a bed wearing a hospital gown. She was holding an icepack to her head, and there were several small white strips on her face. The kind that went over stitches.

Stitches? "What the hell happened?" Raina asked.

Alex, Chen, Lucas, Maggie, and Mal all looked at her. And all started to talk at once. Which made the police office standing next to Marly hold up a hand and then bellow for everyone to shut up because he was taking a statement.

A statement?

Raina stepped into the room and closed the door. "Sorry, Officer. But I'd like to know what happened to my friend."

The officer rolled his eyes, looking exasperated, but then Marly smiled her killer smile at him and said, "Let me just fill Raina in, honey, and then I'll be all yours."

The officer went red and nodded. Marly was charming people while sitting on the end of a hospital bed with a beaten-up-looking face. Raina didn't know whether to be horrified or impressed. She went with impressed. Temporarily.

"What happened?" she asked again.

"What happened is Mal's plan worked. A little too well," Marly said.

Raina looked at her blankly. "Plan?"

"Malachi, please tell me you told Raina what you were doing?" Maggie said.

Mal stayed silent.

Maggie looked appalled. "What the?—"

Alex put his arm around her. "Yell at Mal later, sweetie. Raina needs to know what happened."

"Yes," Raina agreed. "She does." She turned to Mal. Damn. He looked good. Tired, with more stubble than usual lining his jaw and clothes wrinkled to hell, but still good. Which ought to be against the laws of nature. Damned beautiful dark lord.

No. Don't think about the pretty. Find out what the hell he did.

"Mal?" she asked. "What the hell happened here?"

He pushed a hand through his hair, looking kind of pissed off. "We asked Marly if we could take over her Instagram account for a while. She had a couple more messages that ticked some boxes with us. So we started flirting back with the guys. Well, Chen and Marly did that part."

Marly smiled, then winced. "It was kind of funny at first. We just kept replying and seeing who kept coming back for more." She looked over at Chen. "Chen's pretty good at flirting with strangers on the Internet." She sent him one of her killer smiles .

Strangers on the Internet weren't the only thing Chen could charm, apparently.

"You used her as bait?" Raina asked, horrified. "And you didn't tell me?" She shot Mal a glare that should have, if there was any justice in the world, turned him into a pile of ash.

"It was fine. And it was needed to be a secret. Limit the number of people who knew," Marly said. "One of the security team always took me to and from Deacon and wherever else I was going. Chen here, actually." This time the smile she sent in Chen's direction was several degrees hotter than killer. Chen flushed and Raina heard Maggie bite back a laugh.

Marly and Chen. Well, well, well.

She realized she'd gotten distracted again. "In theory, that sounds like a good plan. But how did you end up here with stitches in your face?"

"They'll heal perfectly," Lucas said. "I did them myself."

"I'm sure they will, but I'm more interested in how they got there."

"Well, Chen walked me home tonight, and I let myself in and there was someone in my apartment. He jumped me but he didn't do his research too well if he was Internet-stalking me. Missed the fact that I studied tae kwan do in high school as well as dance. I got loose and that's when he hit me." She touched her faced gingerly, wincing a little.

"And that's when she brained him with the baseball bat she apparently keeps in her umbrella stand," Chen said, sounding proud. "I got the door open and found her standing over him. He was out cold. So I cuffed him and we called the cops, and then Mal, and eventually we wound up here."

"Are you okay?" Raina asked Marly.

"Yeah. My cheek hurts but Dr. Angelo here gave me something good for that and tells me it won't scar. I'll be back as soon as the stitches are out. Apparently I'm not allowed to put makeup over stitches." She frowned at Lucas.

"You need to let it heal. It will only be a week or so," Lucas said. "If you put makeup on and it gets infected then it will scar. Is that what you want?"

"No," Marly said, looking appalled. "Definitely not." Chen, who'd moved closer to her, looked like he agreed.

"And where's the guy now? Do we know his name?" Raina asked.

"Charles Buckley," Mal said. "He was a bit confused when he first woke up, and he gave the cops his real name. Then they found his van not too far from Marly's place. There was a bag of feathers in the back. Our feathers."

"He's the one then?" Raina said. "It's over."

"Let's hope so," Maggie said. "I want to focus on baseball, not break-ins."

"And now that Raina knows the story, perhaps we should leave Marly to finish giving her statement," Alex said. "Chen, will you take her home or wherever she wants to go? Marly, we'll pay for a hotel for you for as long as you want if you don't want to go home yet or if the police aren't done there. I'm sorry this happened to you. It's not exactly what I had in mind when I thought up the Angels."

"That's because you're sane," Marly said. "Thank you, I'm sure Chen will take good care of me."

From the look in Chen's eyes, Raina was pretty sure that he would, too. She followed the other four out into the hall. Maggie looked at her and then Mal and then yawned ostentatiously. "Well, I'm beat," she said. "Take me home Alex. And Lucas, I'm sure you have somewhere to be."

"I do," Lucas agreed. "I have patients here I can look in on in a few hours. Might as well go do some paperwork until then."

"You work here?" Raina asked.

"Sometimes," Lucas said. He bent down and kissed her cheek. "Go easy on him," he whispered and then hurried down the hall after Maggie and Alex.

Raina watched Lucas and then turned back to Mal.

"Not here," Mal said. "I'll take you home. We can talk in the car."

Not being all that keen to have this particular conversation in a hospital hallway, she didn't argue, just followed him back out to where Ned and the big car were waiting.

She climbed into the back and as Ned started the car, she felt herself start to shake.

"Oh my God," she said, sinking back against the leather seat. "You were right."

"What?" Mal said. Then his gaze sharpened. "You're shaking. Come here." He slid across the seat and pulled her close against him.

"I'm fine," she said but she wrapped her arms around him anyway and tried to soak up his warmth as her teeth started to chatter.

"You've had a shock," he said. "It's just adrenaline."

"I know what adrenaline feels like," she managed. "I like adrenaline."

"Well, this is the less exciting kind," he said. His arms tightened around her. "I'm sorry, I never thought he'd get that far."

"You were right," Raina said. "There was someone after us." Then, to her horror, she burst into tears.

Mal just held her, kissing her hair and making soothing noises until she got the sobs back under control and lifted her head. "Sorry, I never do that."

"Adrenaline," he repeated. "It's weird stuff."

"But you were right and I got so mad at you."

"You didn't know I was right. I didn't know I was right. I'd rather I hadn't been."

"But you were right," she repeated and dropped her head back down on his shoulder, feeling horribly guilty.

"I wasn't right in the club," he said. "You were. I overreacted. I'm not sorry I grabbed you. You can't ask me not to try like hell to get to you if I think you're in trouble, but I'm sorry I got carried away. I'm sorry I didn't stop when you told me to. I'm sorry I scared you."

She lifted her face. "I'm sorry I got so mad."

"You were scared. I get mad when I'm scared, too. As I proved that night."

"Well, we make an excellent pair of idiots," she said. She looked up at him. "I missed you. Every minute. You didn't call me."

"You told me you wanted some space. After giving me quite the lecture about listening to you and stopping when you said stop. I thought that was a fairly clear message that not calling you would be the safest thing."

"Only until I calmed down."

"Ah. Sorry, turned my psychic powers off to save my batteries. I missed that part."

She laughed. "Okay, I deserved that. I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry, too," he said. "About a lot of things. I'm sorry Marly got hurt."

"I'm pretty sure Chen is going to make sure that doesn't happen again," Raina said.

"Chen?" Mal sounded puzzled.

"You didn't see how he was looking at her? He's got it bad. And she was flirting with him."

"Marly and Chen?" Mal repeated.

"You really didn't see how he was looking at her?"

"I was too busy looking at you," he said, absolute sincerity ringing in his voice.

She felt her heart suddenly melt into a puddle of goo. "You were?"

"I've spent the last two weeks wanting to see you. I caught a couple of glimpses at the home games but that's it."

"You weren't stalking me on the security feeds?" She'd looked up at the cameras sometimes. Just for a few seconds. Just in case he'd been watching. The thought of it made her feel like an idiot.

"I figured that would be the kind of thing you'd object to. But I wanted to. I missed you. I even missed the giant cat. My couches are way too pristine."

"I'm pretty sure he misses his cat tower," Raina said. "He keeps trying to climb to the top of Luis and Brady's bookcases and knocking things down. I think Luis wants to turn him into a rug."

"Poor Luis," Mal said.

"Poor Wash. Deprived of the luxury he's sure he deserves."

"And what about you," Mal asked. "Are you feeling deprived?"

Was she imagining things or had his voice just dropped down a few notches. She twisted her head up to look at him. And fell right into those hot dark lord eyes. Her heart started to pound all over again.

She was going to be out of adrenaline altogether if this kept up. "Deprived? Hmm, let me think about that. What would I have been deprived of?"

"Would you like me to tell you?"

Her stomach curled. She looked between the barrier that separated the back of the car from Ned. "That kind of depends on how soundproof that is."

"It's soundproof," Mal said. "I swear on every cent I have."

"So I get the Saints if you're lying?"

"One-third of them, sure. But what would you do with a baseball team?" Mal said.

"Turn 'em into winners with my awesome cheer squads," Raina said cheerfully. "Look how well I've done this year."

Mal shook his head at her but then he laughed. "I wouldn't put it past you. Though I for one would be sad if you had to give up burlesque to run a baseball team."

"You would?"

"I would," he said. "That outfit you wore with those wings has been haunting my dreams."

She felt her smile go smug. "It has? What exactly do your dreams entail, O dark lord?"

"You. Feathers. Maybe some rope. Me peeling that leather off you and making you come your brains out."

Her brain went blank at the mental image. "Oh. My," she managed. "And then what happens?"

He proceeded to tell her. In quite a bit of detail. Until she shut him up to prevent herself from bursting into flames by the simple method of climbing into his lap and kissing him.

Oh God. The taste of Mal. After all this time away from him. She let herself drink him in, tongue tangling with his as she squirmed on his lap, trying to get closer.

Mal held on to her and kissed her back with equal passion.

"Ever had sex in this car?" she asked when they broke apart for a second. She wondered if her own eyes looked as lust fogged as his.

He shook his head. "Not that I can recall."

"Well, that's just sad. What's the point of having a limo?—"

"It's not a limo?—"

"You have a driver, this backseat is huge, that's a limo in my book. Stop arguing, I'm propositioning you in your fancy car."

"So you are," he said. "I'm all ears."

She pulled her sweatshirt over her head. "Ears are not a body part that interests me right now."

His eyes were practically black now, the pupils huge. "Any body part you want. All yours."

She lifted her hips to swing her leg free and sit back so she could start to push her yoga pants down. "No one can see in here, right?"

"Right," he agreed. "No panties? Why, Ms. Easton, I'm?—"

"Shocked? You woke me up at three a.m. You're lucky I found matching shoes. Underwear would've been wasting time."

"I was going to say pleased," he said. He slipped a hand between her legs, found her clit with his thumb as one finger slid into her. "But you can keep on talking if you want."

"No talking," she said. "Just you. Come here." She tugged him down so they were sprawled across the leather seat with him on top of her, pulling him against her, arching impatiently as he dealt with his zipper and then was inside her with one hard push that made her gasp.

"God," she managed. "Remind me to fight with you more often if this is how you do makeup sex."

"Not going to happen," Mal said. "You're not getting away from me again." He started to move and she decided she agreed with him. He wasn't getting away from her again. Not if she had any say in it. And then she stopped thinking at all.

Raina's haze of happiness lasted well into the next afternoon. Until Mal came looking for her as she was doing her postgame check of the wings.

"Hey," she said, putting down the feather she was holding.

"Hey yourself," he said. He leaned down and kissed her. "How are they holding up?" He nodded at the row of lockers.

"A couple of feathers adrift. Nothing me and Brady's magic glue technique can't fix. You don't have another home game for a week anyway. Plenty of time."

"If the team keeps playing the way they have, Alex is going to want to take the Angels on the road."

Raina froze. "On the road? I can't travel with the?—"

Mal laughed. "I know. I was teasing. The other owners would have to agree to have the Angels perform at their games. I can't see that happening anytime soon."

"What about next year?" Raina said.

"Unless something drastic happens, I'd say we'll be the Saints and the Fallen Angels for a while yet," Mal said. "Even our Triple A team is asking for them to come and cheer at their games."

"What did Alex say to that?"

"Alex told them if they started winning like the Saints then he'd think about at least letting the Angels come meet the team."

"Sounds like a solid motivational technique for young guys," Raina said.

Mal nodded, but his expression turned serious. "I actually came down to see you about something."

Unease curled through her. "Why don't I like that expression?" she said. "Should I be sitting down?"

"Not sure," Mal said. "It's not exactly good news."

"Okay, I'm sitting," she said. She patted the bench next to her. If she was going to be upset, she might as well have Mal next to her. He was so nice to hang on to. "Come and tell me."

"Well, it's like this," Mal said. "I just got off the phone with the police. They've just finished interviewing Charles Buckley."

"Feather guy?"

"Feather guy. Who apparently has decided that he might as well confess all now that he was dumb enough to give them his name."

"That sounds good. What's the sentence for breaking and entering and assault these days?"

"Long enough that he won't be bothering anyone for a while. The police said they suspect he'd done this before. Stalked women. Maybe worse. They're going to keep working on him to see if they can get him to tell them anything more. But here's the thing. He admitted to doing the wings and to the social media stuff. Admitted to breaking into Marly's place, which was, admittedly, kind of hard to deny but he is denying doing anything to your truck or knowing anything about the stuff that happened at Madame R's."

Crap. Her heart sank. "That means I have my very own stalker out there?"

Mal shook his head. "I don't know. But I'm getting the feeling we're missing something. Graffiti and your tires—that feels more like trying to scare you off or something. It's not the same as the wings and online harassment. No one has been harassing you online, right?"

"No more than usual," Raina said. "I do burlesque, I get a certain amount of idiots, the same as anyone."

"I apologize for my sex," Mal said.

"Oh don't," she said. "I'm quite fond of your sex."

"Don't change the subject," he said with a grin. "So somebody is trying to scare you off." He stopped suddenly. "You haven't heard from Jeremy again, have you?"

She shook her head. "Radio silence since that first email."

"Good. Didn't think so. Then probably not him."

He looked somewhat smug. Which made her suspicious. "Did you do something to Jeremy?"

Mal shrugged. "I may have tracked him down and discussed the error of his ways with him."

It was wrong to feel happy about that, right? She decided she didn't care. And that she didn't want to know what Mal's discussion had involved.

"It was only a discussion," Mal said, seemingly reading her mind. "I didn't beat him up. It was tempting. But unnecessary. Usually is with bullies."

"That's very restrained of you. Are you giving up your dark lord ways?"

"Not entirely," he said, eyes glinting at her in a way that made her shiver with remembrance about exactly what they'd done the night before.

She fanned her face a moment, trying to clear the fog of the heat. "Weren't we talking about something?"

Mal laughed. "Yes. Right. Back on topic. The incidents at the club. New theory. Maybe it's not you they have a problem with, maybe it's the club?"

"You thought it was me originally," Raina said. "Why the change of heart?"

"Originally that was the most obvious solution. But if feather guy isn't guilty, then obviously that might not be the way to go. Maybe it's not personal. Maybe it's business. So who has an issue with your club? Got any burlesque enemies?"

"Corsets and pistols at dawn? No." She snorted. "I really don't know. It's not like we're a strip club. We get a lot of women and couples coming. We're not near any schools or day care centers or churches or anything. I made sure of that when I picked the location. It's mostly bars and restaurants and small businesses and young-and-upcoming couple types."

"Young and upcoming," Mal mused. "Yeah, I saw the for sale signs on some of the buildings in your street. Lots of condos going up."

"The way the market has been, people are happy to sell. I got a great lease because my landlord couldn't find a tenant at the time. Locked him up for five years with an option for five more."

Mal lifted his eyebrows. "Landlord? Now, there's someone who might be unhappy if the market is picking up and he has a tenant in a building he might want to sell. Does your lease have cancellation penalties?"

Raina nodded. "Yeah, he can kick me out with six months' notice but it would cost him."

"Unless you decided to break the lease yourself?" Mal suggested.

Raina stared at him. "It couldn't be that, could it? I mean, I've always known that Phil was a weasel but that's pretty low."

Mal smiled grimly. "I don't know. But I vote we find out."

"Me too," Raina said. "Got time for a little field trip?"

"Hello, Phil," Raina said silkily as she stalked into her unfortunate landlord's grimy office a few blocks away from Madame R. She'd slicked her mouth with red and found her spike-heeled boots again. Her black leather jacket kind of matched Mal's. The thought pleased her.

Phil was middling height with a rapidly expanding waistline, bushy black eyebrows, and graying hair slicked back with gel. He hadn't grown any more pleasant smelling since the last time she'd had to deal with him in person. She fought not to wrinkle her nose against the smell of stale cigarettes, old fast food, and slightly too-long-unwashed male.

Phil got to his feet. "Raina? Late with the rent, are you?"

"You know I've never been late with my rent even once," Raina said pleasantly. She looked at the pile of papers on the chairs in front of Phil's desk. It wasn't often he had visitors. The few times she'd been here the place had been deserted other than two or three of the younger guys he always introduced as his nephews hanging around doing nothing much. She picked up the papers and dropped the pile on his desk then settled herself on the chair. Mal did the same with the other chair, saying nothing.

"Who's your friend?" Phil asked.

"This is my … security adviser," Raina said with a sunny smile. "We had a couple of incidents at the club. So we decided to get some advice on our security setup."

"You do anything like that and you have to pay for it," Phil said. "Check your lease."

"Oh I know," Raina said. "I pull it out every so often to read it. That non cancellation clause makes me happy every time. It's so nice for a girl to have some security in these uncertain times, don't you think?"

Phil frowned at her, brows drawing so close together that she wondered if the extravagant hairs ever tangled together. The expression made him look like a bushy-faced bulldog. Not attractive. "I'm a busy man," he said. "You gonna tell me why you're here?"

"Sure," Raina said. "It's like this, Phil. I'd like for you to stop trying to drive me out of my club. And in return, I won't sue your ass for harassment and vandalism."

Beneath the red patches on his cheeks, she saw Phil turn pale. Bingo. Phil had a guilty conscience.

"I don't know anything about any harassment," he sputtered.

"Are you sure about that, Phil?" Raina asked. "Because Mr. Coulter here has been telling me all about some fascinating innovations in security technology. Did you know they can even get fingerprints off things like scraps of paper? Like, say, a half-burned firecracker."

Phil bristled. "What's a firecracker got to do with me?" Then he frowned. "Did you say Coulter?" He jerked his head at Mal.

"Oh, didn't I introduce my adviser?" Raina said. "Phil Longoria, this is Malachi Coulter. He owns MC Shield, among other things. Maybe you've heard of him."

Phil's eyes widened. "You're one of those guys who bought the Saints."

Mal nodded. "That's correct." His tone wasn't friendly.

"What's a guy like you doing working security for a two-bit burlesque club?" He pronounced the word burlesque like he really wanted to say hooker. Or something worse.

"Perhaps you hadn't heard, Phil. I've been doing some work for the Saints. I've always been a baseball fan," Raina said.

Phil had gone another few shades paler. "You work for the Saints?"

"Yes, she does," Mal said in the deadly deadpan voice. "And at the Saints, we take the welfare of our employees and contractors very seriously. Particularly when one of the incidents Ms. Easton is referring to took place on Saints property. That's the sort of thing we dislike. A lot." He smiled then. The expression was more disconcerting than his serious face had been. It involved a lot of bared teeth. Phil shrank back in his chair a little.

"You can't prove anything," he said desperately.

"You really want to make that play?" Mal asked. "Perhaps this is the part where I mention that MC Shield is one of the biggest security outfits in the country? And the fact that I'm ex-special-forces. You really think I can't take down a two-bit little property shark like you, Phil?" He leaned forward, smile now distinctly unfriendly. "So tell me, Phil. Which way do you want to do this? The easy way or the hard way."

"I'd be happy with the hard way," Raina chimed in. Yanking Phil's chain was proving quite entertaining. She'd obviously watched far too many gangster movies.

Phil, however, didn't seem very happy about it. "What's the easy way?"

"Raina?" Mal said.

She straightened in her chair. "Well, that would be the one where Phil signs another contract with me. One your lawyers draw up to say that if he sells my building I have first right of refusal at a reasonable market value set by three independent parties and get at least twelve months' notice if I decide not to exercise that option."

Phil turned a truly impressive shade of purple, "You can't do that," he sputtered.

"Yes, she can," Mal said. "And said contract will have an additional clause that says I have second right of refusal with the same terms."

Raina turned her head toward him, mouth falling open. "It will?"

"It will," Mal confirmed.

"Okay," she said. Happiness bloomed through her. Mal would buy the building if she couldn't. She wasn't so sure how she felt about that, other than pleased that it had obviously pissed Phil off even more than he'd already been. But the fact that Mal was willing to do something like that for her was definitely a good thing. A very good thing.

She smiled at Mal, trying for a Marly-style killer smile. "Phil, what do you say? Do you want make a deal today or let Mal go to work and find out all the loose ends that are going to lead back to you? Because now that I think about it, some of those nephews of yours look about the right height for the guy we have on tape interfering with my truck. And throwing firecrackers. Do you think they love their uncle Phil enough to go to jail for you? Or do you think they might start talking as fast as humanly possible to save their scrawny asses?"

Phil looked like he was going to explode. For a minute she thought he was going to keep fighting but then he deflated like a popped balloon—or one of her poor truck's tires—and leaned back. "Fine. I'll sign your stupid contract," he said.

"Good," Mal said. "I'll have something couriered to you tonight. If I don't have it back on my desk first thing in the morning, then I'm going to start digging, Phil. And it will be a very deep hole you'll be standing in." He stood then. "Come on, Raina, Phil needs time to find a pen."

Raina followed him out of the building and back down onto the street before she starting laughing. "That," she managed between sputters, "was kind of fun." She gained control with an effort and then tilted her head up at him.

"I don't need you to buy a building for me, you know. I can do it myself."

"I know you can," he said. "But it never hurts to have a backup plan. If I end up having to buy it because Phil tries to pull a fast one, then you can just buy it off me, when you're ready."

"You'd do that for me?"

"Well, Lucas suggested I try to give you the moon but this seems more you."

"It is," she said. "So you'd be my landlord?"

Mal grinned. "I guess so. Why, are you going to try and wrangle a rental discount out of me?"

"Are you susceptible to bribes?" Raina asked.

"Do they involve you and nakedness?"

"Of course."

"Then absolutely," he said. "In fact, I might insist on them."

"I'll start practicing," Raina said. And then she started laughing again because he was just so damned gorgeous. "Hey, Malachi Coulter, I love you, you know that?"

He went still and then the smile she received was the best one yet.

"Me too, Raina Easton," he said, and he kissed her to seal the deal.