Sinclair (Bad Boys of WildeSide Book 2) Read online

  “Write down the details and Mace will get rid of it. You should have told me last night.”

  “Sorry, not used to this covering up stuff. Guess you’ve had lots of practice, huh?” I made a sh sound and put my finger to my lips. “Sorry, I forgot. Mafia rule 101: do not talk about the mafia. Seen but not heard, right? Glad, I’m not your girlfriend.”

  I wrote down the details. He took them silently then moved across the room before pulling his phone out to make a call. The pastry was now sitting heavily in my stomach. What was I doing? Sinclair was just trying to help me, and I was acting like a complete ass. I was so angry. At everyone. At myself for not doing enough to protect my baby. At Nick. At Sinclair, because I felt like he’d abandoned me.

  That wasn’t fair, though. It hadn’t been up to him to save me. He wasn’t responsible for me.

  But my anger needed an outlet, and, unfortunately, he was the closest person.

  “Mace will get rid of the car. I came here for business, and you accompanied me. I have a contact who will vouch for us. Also, people at the hotel will swear they saw us enter the hotel lobby shortly before Nick was shot. We’re covered.”

  I realized then that if the cops linked us together, they could use Nick’s shooting as a chance to come down on him.

  “You shouldn’t do that.”

  “Do what?” he asked, pouring himself some coffee.

  “Shouldn’t cover up for me. Shouldn’t risk yourself. Why are you?”

  He was silent for a long moment, and I thought he wouldn’t answer. Then he turned to me, his face impassive. But his eyes were blazing with emotion. “I lost you. I was supposed to watch over you, but something happened, and I lost you. And while you were missing, obviously, you went through hell.”

  “So you feel responsible for me.” I was surprised to be so disappointed. Come on, I knew he didn’t want me. He’d never wanted me. I was an obligation to him.

  “Yes. I also care about you. A lot. More than I probably have any right to. I thought I was doing the right thing, reuniting you with Nick. He was the father of your baby. It would have been so easy to make him disappear. Made certain you never saw him again. Kept you all to myself. Made you my family.”

  “Why would you have wanted that?”

  “Because I’d decided you were mine.” He gave a hard laugh. “I had it all worked out. The moment I met you, I knew you weren’t like any other women I’d been with. You were sweet and innocent. Young. And I wanted you. You were the first women I ever wanted to introduce to my family. That’s a big thing for me.”

  Shock filled me. He’d wanted me? Why hadn’t he said anything? “Your mom said that. She thought I might have been your girlfriend.”

  “If I’d had my way, you would have been. I had it all figured out. I’d court you slowly, wait for you to finish your degree, start a career. I’m not as old-fashioned as my father. I don’t believe a woman’s place is at home. Although my protective instincts might have worked against me there. I’m a marked man, and I make certain my loved ones are well guarded.”

  Loved ones?

  “I knew I’d have to move slowly. Your ideas of right and wrong were so firm, I wasn’t certain whether you’d welcome my attention. But I couldn’t get you out of my head. Couldn’t stop thinking of you.”

  I’d felt the same way.

  “Then I found out you were pregnant. My world tilted. I don’t believe in divorce. I believe that women and children come first, always. I thought your baby would be better off with its father. That blood should come first.”

  “You thought that just because Nick was the biological father that would make him the best father for my baby? That maybe I couldn’t have done this on my own?” Except I hadn’t wanted to. I’d been terrified. I’d always been afraid of being alone. Abandoned.

  Well, I was no longer that scared child. I’d changed. I didn’t need anyone.

  “I know what it’s like to have someone you trust keep something big from you. I didn’t want that to happen to someone else. I thought he deserved a chance.”

  There was too much knowledge in his voice for me to brush off that statement. “Someone did that to you? Kept their pregnancy a secret?”

  He nodded, his face as cold as stone. “An old girlfriend. By the time I found out about the pregnancy she’d terminated the baby.”

  I winced. “God, that’s horrible.”

  “I would have given her anything she desired if only I’d known. I would have gladly raised the baby alone. It would never have wanted for anything, including my love. But I never knew.”

  “And you thought Nick deserved to know. Too bad Nick doesn’t care about anything but himself. He never cared about the baby or me. All he wanted was the money you gave him.”

  Sinclair shot me a look. “He told you.”

  “How you bought him for me? Yeah, he told me. After the money stopped coming through. Guess you thought I was only worth a certain amount, huh?”

  “That wasn’t the way it was at all.” He leaned forward, his face horrified.

  “No? So why give him that money?”

  “To look after you. To provide for you and the child.” He ran his hand over his face. “I don’t know what I was thinking. You weren’t mine, but I still wanted you to be. I wanted to take care of you. He didn’t have a job. I thought I’d help out. I thought the baby might help focus him.”

  “Yeah, it focused him all right. Once the money stopped, it focused all his energy on us.”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  “You really want to know? Sure you want to hear about how he killed my baby?”

  He let out a deep breath. I could see the way his body tightened, as though he was expecting a blow.

  “I need to know.”

  Chapter Six

  Sinclair

  I held myself so tensely it actually hurt. I didn’t want to hear this. There had to be some reason for the change in her. Something that would make someone so sweet and filled with laughter become so sharp and brittle.

  So filled with anger that she was prepared to kill.

  But if Nick had killed her child, then it explained her fury. There was nothing my mother wouldn’t do for my sister and me. But she’d always had my father by her side, there to protect all of us. Once he died, I’d stepped up.

  Darcy had no one like that. Where were her parents in all this?

  “When I first left your place, I went back to my parent’s house. Nick would visit occasionally. It was a little weird when he was around, but he didn’t stay long. I told Cassie about the baby, I made out that it was a big romance. She was happy, although I could tell she was a bit worried. And the one time she met Nick, she didn’t like him. But I didn’t have to see him much.

  “I knew I had to call my parents, though. I was supposed to be moving to New York to go to Columbia. So after about six weeks, I called them. They were furious. Especially when they found out it was Nick. They told me not to call them anymore, that they wanted nothing to do with me or the baby. Oh, and that I had a week to get out.”

  “What?” Fury filled me. I couldn’t imagine my mom acting that way.

  She smiled sadly. “My parents and I have never been close. I won’t bore you with my poor, little rich girl story; I know there are a lot of people worse off than me. But basically, they spent most of my childhood on vacation. They won the lottery when I was a baby. We’re new money, and the people in our neighborhood didn’t like us much. They thought my mother was too crass, and my father drank too much. They were right. My parents had a huge run-in with Nick’s family a few years back. I wasn’t allowed to see him. Apparently, they were still holding onto their anger. Having him in their home was a betrayal—my mother’s words.”

  “So that’s why you left,” he said.

  She nodded. “I didn’t know what I was going to do. I was panicking. Cassie was in the midst of heading to L.A. with Wilde to open his new club. I didn’t have any other family to turn t
o or friends who were close.”

  And I hadn’t been there for her.

  “It was Nick who came to my rescue. God, I sound like such a naïve fool, don’t I? That I actually needed someone to rescue me is ridiculous. I should have been strong enough to take care of myself.”

  Except she was young and pregnant and without any support.

  “Nick told me it would be okay. That he would look after us. He was so sweet. So confident. He told me he’d find me a place of my own if it made me more comfortable, but that he would rather I move in with him. Where he could look after both of us. I didn’t want to be alone, and I felt more alone than ever. So I moved with Nick to this small apartment in the Bronx. I was so stupid. I wanted to believe him, so I ignored all the warning signs and went with him.”

  “What I didn’t realize at the time is that the reason he was so sweet and kind was because he was being paid to be that way. By you.”

  The accusation in her voice made me flinch. I hadn’t seen it that way, but I could see how she would.

  “I was giving him money to take care of you.”

  “I guess he didn’t realize that there was an end date to those payments. For about five weeks after we moved everything was great. Then the money stopped. And all those little niggles I’d ignored about Nick, the flashes of temper, the mood swings, they became real. He grew angrier and nastier each day. He’d come home blind drunk, screaming and throwing things. It was a nightmare.”

  I stood and paced. The fear in her voice tore at me like a disease eating away my flesh.

  “I should have left. I don’t know why I didn’t.” She gave a harsh laugh. “Actually, yes I do. He would tell me over and over how unwanted I was. How I had nobody. He was right.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “No, I had Cassie. I know that now. At the time, though, I just couldn’t see a way free from him. Cassie was miles away. If I’d just called Cassie, she and Wilde would have come for me. But I wasn’t thinking rationally. I believed him when he said I was useless. Unlovable.”

  And she hadn’t thought to call me because I hadn’t been there for her. Because I’d cut her off without even meaning to.

  “You are not useless or unloved.”

  “No?” She sighed. “We moved into this horrible motel, and he grew progressively more violent.”

  I’d kill him. I forced my hands to unclench and took deep breaths. The last thing she needed was to deal with my anger.

  “One night, he grabbed my phone and smashed it against the wall then crushed it with his foot. Then he slapped me hard across the face. I knew then that I had to go. I didn’t just have myself to think of. I had some money. But I waited too long. The next night he came home, and he was out of it. High on something. He was angry, resentful. He liked to blame me for everything that was going wrong in his life.”

  She stopped and took a breath. I almost stopped her from continuing. I knew I didn’t want to hear what came next, but I had to.

  “He punched me, and I fell and bumped my head. When I came to, he was kicking me. He kicked me so hard,” she paused, and the silence in the room was so deep and engulfing I could scarcely breathe, “that I lost the baby. The baby died inside me, but I still had to give birth to her. They let me hold her. She was so tiny. I couldn’t believe how tiny. But perfect. Just perfect.”

  Tears dripped down her face. I didn’t even know if she was even aware of them. I turned away from her, unable to take her pain. Blind fury raged inside me, slamming through the walls of my control. I let out a low roar. It was too much. My fury needed an outlet. I slammed my fist against the wall. Pain radiated up my arm, and my knuckles throbbed. I embraced the pain, took it as my due for the role I’d played in her tragedy. Again and again, I smashed my fist into the wall until bits of plaster rained down on the carpet.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” I was barely aware I was screaming the word over and over.

  Two small arms embraced me from behind and squeezed. I stilled as her body shook against mine.

  “Please, stop. Please, stop.”

  I turned and clasped her close, holding her against my chest. What was I doing? I was so angry at myself, at that asshole that I was blinded by it. Blind to her pain.

  I ran my uninjured hand over her hair, ignoring the way the other one ached, the blood I could feel dripping down my hand. “I am so sorry, baby.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” she told me.

  “I left you with him.”

  She shook her head. “I made the decision to allow him into my life, to go with him, to stay with him. Not you.”

  But I’m the one who brought him back into her life. I’d thought I was doing what was right. I’d been a rigid, controlling bastard. No longer. No more.

  I took a deep breath in then let it out slowly. “I had someone look into him. There were no signs of violence or drugs.” Only the man who I’d had look into him, was the same man who’d betrayed me. All the pieces were starting to come together and my guilt deepened.

  “Nick kept it well hidden in the beginning, but he was spiraling out of control. He’d always had a lot of pressure from his father to be someone. I think it got to him. By the time I got out of the hospital, Nick had disappeared. I made up some bullshit story for the cops. I didn’t want him in jail. I want him to suffer. I want him dead. Jail is too good for him. So I grabbed his car, packed some stuff, and I managed to track him to Chicago through a friend who he’d been staying with.”

  “So you could kill him.”

  “Yes. Do you think I’m wrong to want him dead?”

  “No,” I told her fiercely. “No, you aren’t the one in the wrong.” But I wanted to be the one to end his life. Because then maybe the guilt for the part I’d played in this tragedy could be somewhat assuaged.

  “But I shot him. It wasn’t like I was defending myself. I bought a gun with the intention to kill him. Bet you’re glad you kept your distance, huh? Dodged a bullet there.”

  “Because I’m the poster boy for morality?” I said disbelievingly. “You don’t know what I’ve done.” And she never would. “And for much less. I wouldn’t have shot him. That would have been too easy; I’d have done much, much worse.”

  She wiped her tears away, looking down at her hands, almost in disbelief. “I cried so much those first few days. When I first found out I was pregnant, I didn’t want it to be true. I wanted it to be a lie. A dream. I wished her away. But as time went on, I loved her. Like I’ve never loved anyone. And he took her away from me. I wanted to die too. Sometimes I think I still do.”

  No. No, I couldn’t allow that. I knelt in front of her, taking her hands gently in mine. “I’ve made a huge mess of things. I know you probably don’t want to be around me. But if you’ll let me, I want to help you. I want to look after you.”

  She stared down at me, her face weary. “There’s nothing left, Sinclair. There is nothing left of the old Darcy. I’m tired. I don’t want to feel. I don’t want to care. It hurts too much when I lose people I love.”

  “I know, baby. I know. But you can work your way through this with help.”

  “No. I can’t. All I want right now is Nick dead. You should have let me go after him.”

  Was she mad? I now understood why she wanted him dead, but wanting him dead and actually being the one to kill him were very different.

  “Killing a person changes you.”

  She gave me an incredulous look. “You don’t think I’m already a changed person? I shot him. I aimed to kill him. I missed. Who knows where the hell he is now? I have to track him all over again, and he’s pretty much burned all his bridges with any friends he had.”

  I stood. “I’m going to take care of Nick.”

  “He’s not your problem.”

  Oh yes, he was. I grasped her face between the palms of my hands. “Darcy, I’m not letting you go after him. He’s dangerous. He could hurt you.”

  “There’s not much more he could do to me.”
>
  I wanted to shake her. I wanted to make her see sense.

  “I’ll find him. I promise you. No matter what, I’ll find him for you. But I can’t let you go. I can’t just walk away from you now. I let you go once, and I’m not making that same mistake again.”

  She was silent for a long moment then took a step back, looking up at me sadly. “There’s nothing of the old me left, Sinclair. I’m not that same girl.”

  “I wouldn’t expect you to be. But you’re still Darcy. I want you to come home with me where I can watch over you, look after you.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I promise Nick will pay.”

  She turned away, rubbing her hands up and down her arms. “I’m just tired, Sinclair.”

  I risked moving up behind her and placing my arms around her. She felt fragile, brittle. Totally breakable. A surge of protectiveness robbed me of my breath even as my body stirred from having her so close.

  “I know, baby. Just come home with me for a while. Let me look after you. Rest. Let me take care of everything else.”

  “I can’t go back to your house. Not with your mother there.”

  I frowned slightly. I thought she’d gotten along great with my mom.

  “I just can’t handle knowing I might have disappointed her.”

  I squeezed her gently then forced myself to loosen my grip. “You would never be a disappointment to her, baby. But if you want to, we’ll go to my apartment in the city. You don’t have to see anyone you don’t want to.”

  She leaned her head against my chest, and my heart stuttered.

  “Okay,” she whispered. “I can’t promise you anything, though. I can’t give you anything.”

  “I’m not asking anything of you, other than to just come home with me.”

  Where she was supposed to be.

  Darcy

  I forced myself to move away from him, even though I wanted nothing more than to curl up in his arms and stay there forever. He was like a huge security blanket; I wanted to wrap myself up in him and let him shield me from the rest of the world.