Stitch by Jaime Lewis (ebook reader online .txt) 📗

his head. “It’s not what she thought.” He blew out a breath. “It was a set-up to look like I was cheating on her so she would break up with me.”

“Oh, please.” Ace stated and rolled his eyes.

“Seriously. If my cover ever got blown, I didn’t want to put Mia in some evil people's crosshairs because she was dating me. I swear to you, I didn’t cheat on her. Yes, it looked that way. The woman with me that night is a colleague of mine, and she was in on it.”

“Why didn’t you just tell her you didn’t want to be with her anymore instead of making her feel like she wasn’t good enough? Although, she was at your place to dump your ass.”

Larkin appeared taken back by that little tidbit.  “What?”

“She went to your place to break things off with you. She knew there wasn’t a future for the two of you.”

“Well, that explains the distance she’d been putting between us.”

Ace nodded in agreement as if the guy was a true dumbass.

Larkin gave Ace an odd look. “If you don’t know where Mia is, then I’m very concerned for her safety. Criminals are connected in this city, and if Mia was targeted, she could be in grave danger.”

Ace looked at McDonnell for guidance on the subject.  He wasn’t going to jeopardize Mia’s case by opening his mouth.

McDonnell’s eyes traveled to Larkin, and he pinned him with a stare, “What is said in this apartment, stays inside this apartment.”

“Understood,” Larkin stated. “And before you ask, I’ve already checked the place for bugs. It’s clean.”

McDonnell nodded. “Mia is safe.” Both McDonnell and Ace explained the series of events leading to where they now were in the investigation. McDonnell also made it known that the bureau had never notified the NYPD.

Larkin looked at Ace for confirmation, and Ace nodded his head.

“Do you have any leads?”

“There are several directions we are looking, one being she could’ve been a target of human trafficking considering what Mia heard about “their” boss having an eye on her.”

Larkin appeared to suddenly take on a sickly look, and Ace wondered what had brought that on.

“Man, are you okay? You look like you are going to vomit.”

Larkin took a couple of deep breaths.

“I’m assuming you haven’t checked the dock area in Jersey where I found Mia.”

The detective shook his head. “We haven’t had reason to look over that way. Since she was abducted in the city, our focus has been on warehouses near the water here.”

Larkin looked Detective McDonnell in the eye. “You may want to expand that to include the docks and warehouses across the river. Lots of activity taking place over that way.”

Larkin turned his attention to Ace. “Where is Mia now?”

“As Ace mentioned, she is safe, with her boyfriend, far from here,” Alex stated, and Ace wanted to laugh at Alex getting a dig in at Larkin. She hadn’t liked the guy since the night Mia called and told her what he had done.  But the question Larkin asked next had Ace wanting to ask a few questions himself.

“Boyfriend?”

Ace smirked. “Yeah, boyfriend.”

“Well, as long as it isn’t her boss, then I’m happy she’s happy.”

“She’s very happy, but why would you think she would date her boss?” Ace asked, looking confused and a little disgusted.

“Oh, shit….”  Alex mumbled next to him, and for the second time within the same conversation, he looked down at her wide eyes and knew there was something that she and Mia had been keeping a secret. All he did was quirk an eyebrow, and she started spilling.

“The night of the gala,” she gave Larkin a look as if she was asking him for confirmation, and from the expression on his face, Alex had hit the nail on the head.  Now they just needed to clue him in.

“What happened the night of the gala?” Ace questioned.

“She came with Dr. Walters. All night he was glued to her as if he was staking a claim to her. I’ll admit it pissed me off.”

“That isn’t all,” Alex spoke up, and Ace could see she was battling something internally when she let out a frustrated sigh. “I promised Mia I wouldn’t tell anyone.”

“Alex, whatever it is, you need to tell us.”

“She called me the next morning on her way to work. After the gala, she stopped by the clinic to drop some papers off to Elijah, which I’m now guessing is whatever Marlon gave to her.”

“Hold up,” Ace said, shaking his head. “I don’t understand. She was with her boss all fucking night. Why didn’t she just give him the papers then?”  Detective McDonnell agreed with Ace.

“Fuck!” Larkin shouted.

“What?”

“Marlon.” Alex nodded her head, but Ace’s head was starting to spin with all of these new developments.

“Right, but according to Mia, Marlon was adamant she drop it off at the clinic that night on her way home. That’s when…” Alex paused and bit down on her lip.  It was a stall tactic.

“When what?” Ace pushed.

“He kissed her.”

Several “whats” echoed in the room, and Ace had even more questions.  Most he would save for his sister. Did she have a thing for her boss?  What about Stitch?  Fuck!

Alex spoke quickly, “It was unwanted. Mia pushed him off and told him he shouldn’t have done that. He told her that it was bound to happen and that he’d wanted to kiss her since the day he first saw her.”

Ace was thanking the Lord for the anger management skills he’d learned because he was ready to punch something. He was boiling. From the sound of it, Mia’s boss had preyed on her from the start of her career. Now that he thought about it, he had a conversation with Mia right after she had accepted the job, and she had mentioned how her salary was way above the normal pay grade of someone just out of school.  Did he pad her pay so she couldn’t say no?  He fucking manipulated his baby sister.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”  Ace looked at