Tough Enough (Tough Love Book 3) Read online

  “What the fuck are you doing?” Marco called.

  Jacob startled and reopened the back door while simultaneously crouching and dropping something that looked like a gun. Marco considered that he might want to hire a firearm instructor to train Jacob before he killed someone.

  “It’s just me, Marco,” he said. He walked carefully toward the car as Jacob retrieved his gun and got back on his feet, slamming the rear door and advancing toward Marco.

  “Why are you still here?” Marco asked.

  “Why are you sneaking up on me?” Jacob answered back, his voice rising. “Are you trying to get killed?”

  “Are you expecting to be ambushed up here? There’s a Kia out on the road...” Marco began.

  Jacob cut him off. “I already was.”

  That stopped Marco’s questions. He pushed past Jacob and looked into the backseat of the Ford Explorer.

  “Fuck.” A guy was laid out on the seat. “Dead?”

  He could see the sheen of sweat on Jacob’s pale face. The man’s hands were shaking, and the barrel of the gun he held kept twitching. “Yep.”

  Marco looked back inside the car. There were betting slips on the dashboard.

  Jacob opened the driver’s door, and to Marco’s relief, set the gun on the console.

  “And where are you going?” Marco said.

  “Holy shit, Marco. What do you think I’m doing?” Jacob replied, his voice getting louder. “I gotta get rid of him!”

  Incredible. How the hell would he know how to dump a body? thought Marco.

  “Why don’t you leave it for me?”

  “To you? And get myself in even deeper?” Jacob put both hands on the top of his head and spun around. “I’m so fucked here, why would I trust you to fix this?”

  Marco pinched the bridge of his nose. “Because the guy’s rental is out front on the road? Because I actually have a crew who can handle it? Because you better get your car detailed?”

  Jacob stopped moving and stared at Marco for a moment. “No connection to me?”

  “No,” said Marco. “I need you too much. That you can trust.”

  Together, they pulled the guy out of the car.

  “Where’s the blood?” Marco asked. He’d expected the back seat to be soaked beyond repair. Instead, it was dry.

  “What?”

  “I heard two shots. Did you shoot him?”

  “No. I missed,” Jacob said. Jacob was back at his car, brushing the betting slips into a pile instead of checking for brains in his upholstery.

  “Fuck you say,” replied Marco. “How the hell is he dead?”

  “He fell, cracked his head on your post. Then I hit him.”

  Marco flipped through the corpse’s pockets, looking for the keys to the Kia. He found a wallet and the fob with its rental ID tag attached.

  “Who is this guy anyway?” Marco asked.

  “No clue.”

  “So why’s he dead?”

  “He followed me here,” Jacob said. “From your dad’s place.” Jacob’s voice was getting louder, higher.

  Marco blinked, trying to work it out. His father had asked Marco to pick up some money, and since Jacob had been in New Jersey, Marco had asked Jacob to do it. This was the kind of thing they’d never have to deal with if his old man would just come into the twenty-first century. You could get anything you wanted online. Why base your criminal enterprise in the real world? Such a waste of time. Beside him, Jacob was working himself up into a fit.

  “He followed me,” Jacob cried, flinging a hand out, betting slips floating to the drive. “I’m a prosecutor! I can’t have people trailing me from your father’s...” Jacob’s face flushed, his mouth folding in on itself as he struggled to find the right words. “Flop house!”

  Marco waited Jacob out as they both picked up the white slips from the gravel drive, letting Jacob take a breath. The guy was a fuckin’ genius with cyber-currencies, but he was monkey balls when it came to crime.

  Jacob stared at Marco. “He saw me talking to your father’s goons. He saw me take the money and he followed me to your place. From one mobbed up house to another! What the hell was I supposed to do?”

  “And you don’t think this is supposition?” Marco asked incredulously.

  “I couldn’t chance it! He came up the driveway. He was taking pictures. I didn’t wait to find out if he got me in them. I just reacted,” Jacob said, a plaintive note creeping into his voice.

  Marco decided to put them both out of their misery, figuratively.

  “I get it. This is my mess. I’ll clean it up,” Marco said. “You were doin’ me a favor. Where’s the camera?”

  Jacob tossed Marco a cell phone. They were in luck, the thing was still unlocked. Marco checked the outgoing texts.

  “The good news is you can’t tell it’s you or your car,” Marco said, turning the phone so Jacob could see the photo. He scrolled up. Not a single freakin’ picture of Jacob with his father’s men. Monkey balls.

  Marco shook his head, then he walked down the drive to collect the Kia. He could not catch a break.

  Chapter 1

  Bronx, New York

  September 2019

  Sophia Moss shifted the weight of Ben Connelly’s arm off her hip. The man was as heavy as a dead horse.

  Get off, she thought. Her eyes weren’t even open, and she was already annoyed. Sophia gave Ben a shove, not all that gently, and thrust her leg out from under the quilt, the air soothing after the cloying heat of the bed. She hated being spooned.

  Slithering from the bed, her long cotton T-shirt riding up around her waist, Sophia thought, not for the first time, that maybe she didn’t love Ben as much as she thought she did. Hot shame raced through her. Why didn’t she want to be cuddled? Why didn’t she fall all over Ben? His sun-kissed hair, rugged good looks, and chiseled body caught female attention everywhere they went, and he loved her, right? He never had a glance to spare for anyone but her, and yet, she just couldn’t summon up an ardor that matched his.

  What’s wrong with me? She let herself out of the bedroom quietly, her bare feet silent on the bamboo flooring in the hall.

  By the time she was out of the shower, the water and soap had washed away the momentary introspection, and she’d once again convinced herself mature relationships were built on things other than passion. Mutual agreements about where the couple wanted to live, for instance, the number of children they wanted, respect for each other’s careers and friends in common all counted for something, after all. Together, the sum was surely more significant than the nagging disappointment of their evening kiss on arriving home. Sophia was a practical sort; Ben was a good catch. In the bathroom, steam fogged the mirror and that was just fine with her for now. She didn’t want to see her face anyway.

  Because we don’t agree on the essential things either, do we? She thought.

  As she combed out her long hair and ruthlessly ironed the frizz out of it, she thought about the photos she had in her work bag. It had been more than two years since Ben had borrowed her brother’s truck and carried a bag of cash over the Hudson River. In a run-down neighborhood off the New Jersey turnpike, Ben had got out of the vehicle, walked out into the street and handed the money over to a middle-aged man with mats of dark hair on his arms. At that moment, Sophia’s world changed. She went from being an ambitious law student with a promising future to a woman obsessed. Find the man, follow the money, and do what neither Ben nor her brother had done, find out what in the living hell had happened to George Connelly.

  In her bag, the photos waited for her to work up the nerve to show them to the man she shared her life with.

  Don’t be an ass, she told herself. I’m not much of a prosecutor if I can’t get my own partner to look at a photo line-up.

  She wiped off the mirror and carefully put on her eyeliner, blush, and lipstick, feeling the tension bloom in her stomach. She hurried to finish up and headed out to the kitchen. Time to put on your big girl pants and get to wor
k.

  “So, what’s on the docket today?” Ben’s words were light and teasing as he handed Sophia her morning coffee.

  She chewed her lip, thinking of how to ask him. Morning light poured through the windows and spread across their table. Gazing at Ben across the kitchen, Sophia chided herself for her thoughts this morning. Ben was her partner, the man she loved, at least, the man she thought she loved. As for Ben, his feelings for her seemed genuine. Warm affection was written all over his face, as evident as the sandy blond night beard he hadn’t shaved yet. She could do this.

  “There was a bust at a bodega this week,” she began.

  Ben leaned back against the counter in the kitchen that they had designed together. “Yeah?” Overtones of suspicion colored the single word. Damn. He was already guessing where this would go.

  “Stolen credit cards,” she murmured as she took a seat at the table.

  “And?” He turned his back on her and refilled his coffee.

  “And, so, one of the guys on the surveillance video looks like the guy, you know, the hairy one. The guy you gave the cash to.” She raised her chin. When he didn’t turn back around, she pressed on. “Look at me, Ben.”

  “What do you want me to say, Sophia?” Ben put the coffee pot back on the burner with a slight thud. He came to the table and sat across from her, first setting his cup aside, then pushing hers away. He took her hands in his, rubbing his thumbs over her knuckles. “You know I don’t want you messing around in that. George has never returned. Do you get that?” He lifted their joined hands and gave them a shake.

  “I do, Ben. I do,” she said. George was Ben’s older brother, and he’d been gone for almost three years. In debt to loan sharks, he’d left his wife and children after he’d been badly beaten for failure to pay. After George’s disappearance, threats and finally, arson made it clear that the debt had been transferred to Ben. So, with his family and his friends, including Sophia’s brother, he had raised funds to pay off the debt, a move that Sophia had strongly objected to. On the day the money was handed over, Sophia, then a law student and intern with the district attorney’s office in the Bronx, had followed Ben. She’d photographed the hand-off. The fact that she’d done so against Ben’s wishes was a topic that never failed to raise an argument between them.

  Ben released one hand and tapped Sophia’s forehead, sun-toughened wrinkles fanning out from his eyes as he squinted at her. “You understand it up here, Sophia, in your mind.” She started to speak, but he cut her off. “But not in your heart, girl. You don’t truly understand what never coming back means.”

  He was wrong about that. Working in the prosecutor’s office, she saw more death and pain in a year than most.

  “Uh-uh, girl,” he hissed as if he could read her mind. “Seeing it happen to other people and being face-to-face with your own death are two different things.” Sophia felt a shiver run through her. It was the closest Ben had ever come to saying he thought George was dead. She felt him squeeze her hand. When he spoke again, his voice was low and rough. “Please, Soph, let it go.”

  “Just a few photos,” she said. “It would be so helpful.” She pulled the sheaf of pictures from her work bag at her feet. Across from her, Ben slumped back in his chair and stared at the ceiling. She laid the glossy paper on the table, fanning out the grainy, enlarged pictures. “Do you think this is him, Ben?”

  “You were there, damn it, Sophia. Just match it to your picture. I can’t stop you.” His long, beautiful throat worked as he glared at the plaster above him. “I’m going to tell you no, even if it’s the guy, do you understand that?”

  “Just look at them and lie to me then,” she said, and even though she knew she shouldn’t, she moved around the table and sat next to him, knowing how hungry for her affection he was, how lonely in their partnership. She ran her palm down his cheek, and he grabbed at it, pressing her hand to his face, his beard prickling her. She had a photo of Ben handing a bag to a man. Without Ben’s testimony, it meant nothing. Beside her, Ben was turning and kissing her palm, his eyes shut, furrows digging between his brows. Her heart broke for him, and still, her pulse counted the distance between them steady and calm. Was it this way for anyone besides her? Did other people feel both empathy and distance? She knew it was a terrible thing to do, but she did it anyway. She begged him. “Please?” Her morality so cloudy now, she almost didn’t care that she was manipulating this man who loved her. “It means so much to me.”

  Eyes still shut, he kissed her palm again. He released her hand with a sigh, and devious woman that she was, she stroked the staunch column of his neck, let her thumb slide over the dip beside his Adam’s apple. She set her hand on his pulse, felt the heavy, fast beat of it, and with that information gained, she let it drop to her lap. It was as if she’d never seen her hand before. Where had the long fingers, the perfect fingernails, painted in creamy beige, come from? Her manicure was as cool and passionless as she.

  Sophia raised her eyes and watched Ben. He looked at the table, used one blunt, calloused finger to push the pictures apart. His face was stone. “Never saw this man.” Her heart sank. He pushed back his chair, rose, dumped his coffee down the drain, and, as he left the kitchen, he said, “I’m getting in the shower. Have a good day at work.”

  “Not so fast, Mr. Connelly.” The wooden chair scraped as she pushed back and rushed to catch him. He was in the doorway to the bathroom, his back to her, boxers hanging from his hips, one arm braced against the doorframe.

  Sophia blew out a breath in frustration. Ben kept acting like she should be a tax attorney.

  “You knew I was going to be a prosecutor. You know this is my job.” This was not her fault.

  “What do you want from me, Miss Moss?”

  She flung her arm out behind her, gesturing toward the kitchen. “That man terrorized your brother. Why won’t you ID him?”

  Sophia flinched as Ben’s fist hit the doorframe. “Come on, Sophia! You cannot be this dense, can you?” He turned to face her and crossed his arms over his chest. She had a feeling he was trying to keep from reaching out and shaking her. “George,” he choked, his face flushing darkly. He tried again. “Look. I can’t change what happened. I hope like hell my brother is out there somewhere, alive.” He gestured helplessly toward the walls and she knew she’d pushed him too far. The pain on his face was as clear as the glass in their living room windows. “You can push and push Sophia. You can stroke me and lie to me if you want, but I will never, never, do anything that closes the distance between you and those animals. Do you understand me? Never.” He turned away and stopped with his back to her, the muscles in his shoulders bunched, his head hung. “How can you ask me to risk losing you too?”

  The door shut behind him, the sound of the water following.

  There it is, she thought. She shoved down the sense of guilt his words had washed her with. Ben might not be willing to help her, but she was going to close the gap all on her own, because the heavyset man with matted hair on his arms and the beard that practically merged with the dark, thick hair spilling from his open collar, was absolutely the man Ben had handed over thousands of dollars to. She would bet her life on it.

  Sophia dumped the photos into her bag and put on her ivory trench coat. Pulling the belt tight, she stepped into her Gucci flats and let herself out of the apartment. She stopped on the landing, listening.

  Groans were rising in the stairwell. A deep chuckle that she knew to be her brother’s drifted up to her. Derrick and his wife, then. Allison’s throaty giggle and a hushed “St-aahhp...” followed by a thump. Sophia cleared her throat and steeled herself for the trip past the second floor landing. One flight down, a turn, and there they were, Allison backed up against the railing, Derrick with his massive arm wrapped around her shoulder, his giant palm cupping the back of her curly head. The woman’s eyes were joyful, a brilliant smile on her face.

  “Mornin’, Soph!”

  “Get a room,” she said and hurried down th
e stairs, her brother’s laugh chasing her into the street.

  “Ay, Karito! Sit straight!” Marley Araya smoothed her daughter’s hair and smiled ruefully. Nobody would guess this was her child, the way the red highlights shone in her light brown hair. With her mother’s brown skin and her absentee father’s blue eyes, Karito was striking and strange looking. She was also smart as a whip and wore her father’s coat of anger. Was simmering anger something that came in through the genes? Marley wouldn’t have thought so. Then again, there were a lot of things she hadn’t expected when she’d become a single mother.

  “I thought we were going to me abuela.” Karito turned her pale eyes toward her mother. One night. Marley still couldn’t believe this was where that night landed her, raising a child, praying her elderly mother stayed healthy enough to watch Karito while Marley worked endless hours, supporting all three of them in a one-bedroom apartment.

  “After I speak with your principal.” She kept her voice soft. She’d learned that her voice could trigger her daughter’s anxiety and, sometimes, her rage. They sat on a pair of wooden straight-backed chairs, part of a set of six lined up against the wall outside the administrator’s office. At the other end of the little line of seats, a young father and his son sat. Marley exchanged a smile with the man, two parents in the same boat, the boy was slumping, head down and remorseful, while her daughter...

  Karito started kicking the rungs of the chair. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

  “Karito.” Marley laid a hand on her daughter’s knee.

  The child was restless, like her father. Marley was usually glad to see Karito would grow up to have determination. That was one thing she would need in this world. Right now, though, she wished Karito looked a bit more worried and a bit less assertive, more like that boy over there.