Kristen Ashley - The Promise

I got my hands on Gus just as Ben got his hands on me. I pulled Gus to my chest. Benny pulled my ass onto his lap.

Gus licked my jaw, then threw himself at Benny.

Ben took hold of the dog in one arm, kept hold of his woman in the other, and caught my eyes.

“Chrissy and Eva are okay. Your little sister doesn’t have a ridiculous name, icing on the cake. Your other sister is a whackjob, no surprise. So, with Eva bein’ called Eva, you’re not battin’ five hundred in this mess. I’m thinking seven fifty. Not bad.”

I lifted a hand to scratch Gus’s booty and settled further in Benny’s lap, noting, “Eva being Eva is definitely a silver lining.”

Gus threw himself on the couch, then plopped side-first into a toss pillow and started cleaning himself. Benny wrapped both arms around me and drew me nearer.

“You gonna call your dad?” he asked.

“And say what? You’re a douchebag?” I asked back.

Ben smiled.

I shook my head and gave him the real answer, “No. I have nothing to say to him, and even if I did, he’s less prone to listen to me than Nat was. Doesn’t matter anyway. Chrissy’s a fighter. If he doesn’t do right by Eva financially, she’ll see he does.”

His arms gave me a squeeze. “That’s my Frankie.”

I had no reply because I was his Frankie, and anyway, I was enjoying his words and his arm squeeze enough it took all my attention.

“So, you’re done dealin’ with your whackjob family?” he asked.

I grinned. “I’m done dealin’ with my whackjob family…” I paused, then finished on a warning he already knew, “Today.”

That got another smile from Benny, before, “Right. Next up, choices: watch the game or make out on the couch, then watch the game.”

No choice, really.

I got closer, wrapping my arms around his shoulders. “Make out on the couch, then watch the game.”

His eyes dropped to my mouth and he muttered, “I like the way you think.”

It was my turn to smile.

Ben slid a hand up in my hair and pulled my mouth to his.

Then he twisted and moved so my back was to the couch, he was on me, and his tongue was in my mouth.

I heard my phone start ringing.

Neither of us broke the kiss. We both ignored it.

Some time later, after making out and then watching the game, I went into the kitchen to make my man and myself a sandwich for lunch.

Before doing this, I checked my voicemail.

When I did, I learned the joyous news that my sister was having a baby.

Fucking finally.

I brought our sandwiches into the living room and enjoyed Ben’s grin when I hauled out seven bags of chips, along with some beers and a jar of pickles. Then I called Cat to celebrate and give her the lowdown on the whackjobs in our family. I then told her I was done, she wasn’t wading in, and from here on out, they had to sort their own shit.

Her response:

“Fucking finally.”

The next morning, Benny’s phone ringing woke me and I knew it woke him when I heard him mutter, “Fuck.”

This made me smile as I was prone to smile any day I woke up next to Benny, even if he woke cursing. I felt his heat go from my back where he was spooning me. I turned with him, opening my eyes, and saw him reaching toward the nightstand to get his phone.

He got up on a forearm on the bed, put the phone to his ear, and greeted with a “Benny.”

He listened for a few seconds before he twisted his neck, his eyes coming to me, and my stomach clutched at the look in them. Then he pulled himself up to rest his back against the headboard, took the phone from his ear, hit a button on the screen, and a very attractive deep male voice came from it.

“…investigating,” the voice said. “I understand from our former clients you have copies of what they’ve uncovered and it’s their understanding it would be safer for you to pass that on to us. I’d like to ask you to go to a restaurant called Frank’s on Main Street in Brownsburg sometime today. A man named Herb will be there. You can give him the flash drives. I’ve got a man en route to Brownsburg. He’ll meet up with Herb and get the drives. We’ll take it from there.”

The voice quit talking and Ben said toward the phone, “Bud, no offense, but I do not know you. You’re a voice on the phone callin’ early on a Sunday with no warning. So I’m not givin’ anythin’ to some random guy at a restaurant.”

“I was told that you’ve been informed our services were engaged,” the voice replied.

Oh my God.

Was this the Nightingale guy?

My eyes flew to Benny and I saw his were on his phone.

“Listen,” he said. “Again, I do not know you so I’m not sayin’ dick about anything.”

“You can look us up on the Internet,” the voice replied. “Like I said, I’m Lee Nightingale. I own Nightingale Investigations. The man I’m sending is Luke Stark. He’ll be there this afternoon. We want the drives prior to his arrival so we can sort through them and set him on task without delay.”

“If you do what you do for a living and you know what’s goin’ down with this and you had your woman on the inside, would you take a phone call from a guy you don’t know and do what he tells you to do?”

There was a moment’s hesitation, then, “I see your point. Look us up on the Internet. You got an email address, give it to me. I’ll send you one and it’ll have our domain in the address.”

“Not sure that makes me feel better,” Benny stated, not knowing anything about email or that it would be quite the task to register and use a domain name just to pull one over on an unsuspecting, protective, Italian hot guy first thing on a Sunday morning.

“Then I’ll give you this to make you feel better,” Lee Nightingale returned. “We started investigating this and our clients ran out of funds. We did not like what we found so we didn’t stop investigating, even after they could no longer pay for our services. We undoubtedly have more than you, perhaps enough to lay this shit open and stop a bad drug from hittin’ the market. You got the evidence to tie that bow, we’d be obliged. More so if we could quit dickin’ around, get it, and sort it before any more hits are called. And last, do all this before Salvatore Giglia and his goons get more involved and make this mess messier and possibly take indictments off the table due to mob involvement.”

At that, I gasped quietly and Benny looked at me.

Nightingale knew about Sal.

When Ben caught my eyes, I said, “Maybe we should meet this Herb guy at Frank’s.”

“Is that Francesca Concetti?” Nightingale asked.

I looked to the phone. “Yeah.”

“You’re off assignment,” he stated instantly (and bossily). “So is everyone else. Giglia’s men took care of the hired gun on Furlock. Now you can call Giglia off. Get the drives to Herb. Tomorrow, go in. Work. We’ve got it from here.”

Excuse me?

Some random guy on the phone “has it from here?”

I leaned toward Benny’s cell and snapped, “There are a lot of people who’ve stuck their necks out for a long time who have a lot riding on this.”

“Frankie,” Ben murmured.

“They can quit stickin’ their necks out,” Nightingale returned.

“And that’s a good thing,” Benny put in.

I turned my eyes to him to see his on me and I glared.

He turned his gaze to his phone at the same time he brought it closer to his face (and further away from mine). “We’ll look you up. Send an email. In it, write something that only your clients will know. We’ll confirm that information with the clients, and if it jives, we’ll meet this Herb guy at Frank’s at one o’clock. We’re keepin’ copies of the drives. And we want direct lines to you and this Stark guy so we can stay informed about how shit is goin’, and by that, I don’t mean email.”

“Luke doesn’t do email,” Nightingale muttered, and I saw Ben give me a smug look so I rolled my eyes. “This is my personal cell,” he continued. “Text me your email address. We’ll confirm with Herb that he’s meeting you at Frank’s.”

“Right,” Ben said.

“And, heads up, Herb is…” Nightingale started, paused, and went on, “Unusual.”

I felt Ben tense as he asked, “Unusual how?”

“He’s not young. He’s not tall. He has red hair. He’s loud. He’s likely to say something inappropriate. And he’s very much from Indiana.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“That means don’t wear red because he’s from a Purdue family,” Nightingale answered.

I’d been living in Indiana less than a year, and still, I totally knew what this meant.

“Red’s out,” I murmured.

“We good?” Ben asked Nightingale.

“Yeah,” Nightingale replied. “Text the email. We’ll get you Luke’s information and you and your woman can stand down.”

Benny was not tense at that. I could tell by his face he was cautiously relieved.

“I’ll talk to Sal and do the hand-off,” Ben told him.

“Right. Thanks. This’ll be over soon.”

“Fuckin’ hope so,” Ben muttered.

“It will,” Nightingale’s deep, attractive voice said, and it did this so firmly, I believed him.

“Right,” Benny said. “Later.”

“Later,” Nightingale replied, and Benny touched the button to end the call.

He then touched more buttons, asking, “What’s your email?” I gave him my email address and his thumb moved over his screen. He must have hit send because he looked to me. “Fire up your laptop, cara.”

My eyes got squinty at the order. “Can I have a good-morning kiss first?”

“You can have a good-morning fuck—a long one, a happy one, a celebratory one—if we can pass this shit off to some PI from fuckin’ Colorado, get Sal out of it so he won’t demand we name our first son after him, and concentrate on you either gettin’ the go-ahead to work from Chicago or findin’ a job in Chicago so I can get home and take my baby with me.” He leaned toward me in order to finish, “All of this requiring you to fire up your laptop.”

“You’re grouchy when you get woken up by some PI from Colorado,” I noted.

“Yeah, seein’ as this necessitates me doin’ a bunch of shit I don’t wanna do prior to buryin’ my dick inside my woman, that happens.” When I didn’t move, just continued glaring at him, he went on, “And I get grouchier when she lies there givin’ me the evil eye instead of gettin’ her sweet ass out of bed and gettin’ her laptop.”

“I think I’ve made it relatively clear you bein’ bossy isn’t my favorite thing,” I told him.

“It is when you’re wet for me,” he returned.

It sucked, but he had a point.

And it irked me, but my choices in that moment were either to have a staring contest with Benny, continue our fight, which was kind of ridiculous, or go and get my laptop.

I decided on going to get my laptop, but as I threw the covers off me (and, thus, Benny since I intended to climb over him because his side was closer), I did it bossing.

“I’ll get my laptop and take care of the first part of the operation. You go walk Gus.”

I was climbing over him but didn’t make it when his hands curled under my arms. I let out a surprised noise as he flipped me to my back, covered me, and laid a hard, short kiss on me.

When he lifted his head, he asked, “Satisfied?”

Not hardly.

“That better be a promise of things to come,” I replied.

“When isn’t it?” he asked.

And he had another point, this one excellent.

“Stop bein’ awesome when I have shit to do.”

He grinned.

I scrunched my face at him.

That made him smile. Unfortunately, he did this rolling off me so I didn’t get the full force of it, though, this had its benefits since I could see to my business, he could see to Gus, and then he could get down to fulfilling his promise.

I got my laptop, fired it up, and brushed my teeth. Ben pulled on jeans, his tee, and running shoes, then got our dog and the leash and took off.

I got the email. Then I called Tandy to ask her to ask her friend what colors were used in “Roxie and Hank’s” wedding. I pulled on yoga pants and a cami while Tandy made her call.

Ben came back while I was making coffee. “We good?” he asked, letting Gus off the lead whereupon he waddle-galloped into the kitchen and started jumping up my calves.

I bent to pick him up, and when I had him in my arms for a squirmy cuddle, I told Benny, “Waiting for confirmation from Tandy now.”