For Logan (Chicago Syndicate Book 5) (2 page)

“You don’t need to rescue me.” I try to shake off his grip, but he doesn’t budge. “And by the way, you aren’t
handling
this situation either; you simply told him to leave. I could’ve done that too. I’d have thought you’d make better use of your mouth, considering your constant parade of conquests.”

A smirk flashes across his face, one that holds a lethal dose of masculinity, and he pulls me slightly closer. “When I’m with a woman, my mouth is usually occupied with something other than words.”

Annoyed at his entertained and patronizing attitude, I say with a fake smile, “Just go back to your date.” Moving away, I utter, “Eat a dick!”

“No, thank you. I just had dinner,” he responds sarcastically.

I really need to learn to control the volume of my voice.

“Where are you going, baby?” he adds, and I can hear the smile in his voice.

“Don’t call me
baby
,” I grind out without facing him and return to the bar, grunting in irritation. Where
am
I going? He’s my ride. If I take a cab, my parents will flip out. While mulling over my options, I toy with the gold-plated cross pendant that hangs around my neck. Since all my friends have left by now, I reluctantly retrace my steps back to Wade.

“Let’s go, brat,” Wade orders smugly.

I follow him as he leads the way toward the entrance. His metallic white convertible is parked right outside. The retractable hardtop is closed since the mild temperatures of October are coming to an end.

“So what happened to your date? Wasn’t she good enough to go home with the magnificent Wade?” I tease.

After clicking the key device to unlock his car, he holds the door open for me. “Her name was Olivia-Jen. I hate double names.”

With one foot suspended in the air, I freeze. “That’s such a randomly strange thing to hate. You’re so weird.”

“And you’re so blunt,” he counters, his impatience with me launching back to the surface.

I smirk. Usually, he seems completely unfazed.

“Do you say everything that comes to mind?” he chides.

“Well, yeah, kind of. What’s the point in not saying what you think?” I sink into the passenger seat and look up at him, joking, “Regarding Olivia-Jen, you can just call her baby and work around not knowing her name.”

For a second, it appears as if I’ve stunned him. He observes me with an unreadable look on his face before shutting the door.

When he moves inside, I smile. “That’s what you do, isn’t it? You actually call your dates baby so that you don’t have to remember their names.”

His silence is an affirmative answer as he shifts the car into
drive
with force.

During the fifteen-minute ride to Lincoln Park, Wade’s back to criticizing me. “Stay away from Mykhail Medlov, Rosa. You need to find new friends.”

With a groan, I rest my head back against the seat. “It’s Rosalia. No one calls me
Rosa
,” I say, forgetting that he’s ten years my senior until he starts to reprimand me.

He ignores my statement. “How can you put yourself at risk like that? Cam won’t always be there to help you out.”

“Enough with the lecture. You don’t know me or my family.”

When his phone screen lights up from the compartment right above the gearshift, he glances down. I peek at it too and frown before he hurriedly grabs it and slides it into his shirt pocket. Nevertheless, I’ve already seen the message from
Nana
reading,
Logan, when will you be here?

“Your name is Logan?” I blurt out. “Why do I know you as Wade? Or as Richard. Isn’t your name Richard Wade?”

His lips thin into a hard line, and he pretends, rather idiotically, not to have heard me.

“Where do I drop you off? Front or back?” he demands to know as he pulls onto the street where I live.

“Around back. I stay in the pool house.”

“Oh, decadent,” he mocks, trying to move away from the subject.

“So,
Logan
,” I retort.

His gaze whips to me and then back onto the road. “Rosa, don’t get into trouble again,” he says simply.

Smiling, I disregard his comment and continue, “You don’t want people to know that you’re actually named Logan?” His evasive behavior makes me more intrigued.

“Jesus Christ, do you ever shut up?” he grumbles, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel as though he’s losing patience with me.

Somehow, I’m glad to have finally gotten a real reaction from him, instead of his cockiness.

“Rarely, Logan. I could do this all night,” I answer proudly.

“No, you can’t.” He hits the brake and I’m jerked forward in my seat. “You’re home. Get out.”

“Well, then I guess we’ll finish this riveting conversation another time.”

“No, we won’t,” he declares as my hand touches the door handle.

“Do you just have a habit of saying
no
?” I taunt.

He inspects me for a moment, and as usual, I don’t falter under his scrutiny. Then he leans a tad closer, his breath fanning my cheek. I swallow, his nearness making me warm, and his lips curve up, whether in annoyance or amusement, I don’t dare to guess.

“
No
. Goodnight, Rosa.”

He keeps on calling me Rosa, challenging me, so I reply in kind as I step out of the vehicle, “Goodnight, Logan.”

“Wade,” he corrects.

“Goodnight, Logan,” I repeat and close the door, hearing him curse, which makes me feel victorious, but I’m not even sure why.

It seems like we’ve started to play a game.

Logan

––––––––

“F
uck!” I run a hand through my hair as I drive away, watching Rosa in my rearview mirror.

Oftentimes, her bluntness aggravates me. No woman has ever managed to corner me and trick me into banter the way she does. Ordinarily, I’m the one who dominates a conversation and can fluently steer it into the direction I prefer, but Rosa blindsided me when she called me Logan. It’s been a long time since anyone, except my grandmother, used that name. I haven’t been Logan since I learned the hard way that life isn’t fair and only answered Rosa’s questions to make them go away. I don’t actually hate double names. Hearing the name
Olivia-Jen
just reminds me too much of my deceased sister, Jenny.

My phone beeps with an incoming message, and I fish it out of my dress shirt pocket.

Adriano: Do you have smartphones that I can control via another phone?

I grin, knowing that I have what he wants. Heading toward a nondescript residential tower in the Loop, I park in the garage and walk to the entrance where I place my finger on the screen above the door handle to be scanned.

It unlocks with a click and the automated voice states, “Welcome, Agent Wade.”

I push through the door, toward the elevator, and travel up to the top floor where it opens into CIA headquarters’ technology room. Two rows of computers are lined up parallel to each other in the center of the room, encrypting data twenty-four seven. And two walls are shelved with guns, ammunition, cellphones, tablets, earpieces, and tons of gadgets, such as implantable tracking devices.

I grab five smartphones that are equipped with
Zeus
software, which is not available to the public. Then I program the security settings, easily overwriting the original factory settings. On this type of mobile, data can be blocked by another untraceable account. If you want to control someone’s life without leaving an electronic trail, these phones are a perfect first step.

As a CIA agent in charge of acquiring and distributing technological gadgets, I have unlimited access to all these devices, which has come in handy with my original mission, infiltrating the Syndicate to find out how they set up their international drug trades and sell the drugs throughout Illinois without getting caught. This group is huge with hundreds of soldiers who execute the day-to-day work of selling the actual drugs, collecting the money, and importing the purest heroin and cocaine from South America into Chicago, Illinois.

I started to investigate and gain access to the Syndicate via the underboss’s wife, Fallon, but when they found out the type of equipment I could provide them with, I was in.

Over the last few months, I’ve established a prosperous affiliation with the Syndicate, but I also recognized the opportunities they provided and, therefore, without the CIA’s knowledge, I defected from the CIA to become one of the Syndicate’s associates. As an associate, I make more money – money I need to take care of Nana. I know that, ultimately, the rich survive, not the noble. This life has only given me death, poverty, and loneliness, and I’ve seen so fucking much inequality that I don’t believe in justice and the agency anymore.

But an associate isn’t an official member. Until I’m a formal member of the Syndicate
and
on their regular payroll, I don’t need Rosalia Calderone interfering with my carefully scheduled plans – she’s the first one to find out my real name.

What will she do with that info?

***

I
t’s not long before I see the girl who can’t seem to quit talking again. The next night, I’m wandering around a decked out Club 7, the most successful dance club in the Chicago Loop. It’s owned by the Syndicate’s boss, Adriano Montesi, and has an elitist underground sex club. The club is also used as a front for laundering their drug money.

The large space with a fourteen-foot-high ceiling and a balconied second floor has been transformed into a haunted mansion for Halloween, decorated with cobwebs, pumpkins, fake blood, and rubber body parts. I cross the center of the black and white tiled dance floor, where the DJ is playing on a raised podium, as the bass pulses against my eardrums. Searching for Adriano to deliver his new phones, I scan the black staircase that leads to the second floor where his office is located, grinning at the women I catch eyeing my gladiator attire.

When I turn my focus back to the first floor, I notice a tall woman standing with her back to me at the glass bar spanning the right wall. My eyes leisurely travel up her body, black jeans show off incredible shapely legs and accentuate a round ass I want to sink my teeth into, and she’s one of the few women who’s not wearing ridiculous high heels. Then I see long dark hair—fuck! It’s Rosa. She’s transformed into a vampire, but I recognize her movements, amazing myself with that observation. Her waist is cinched into a red lace corset, and she’s tossing back a drink. Damn if she isn’t the sexiest vampire in here.

Before I know it, I’m drawn to her, crossing the dance floor through the fog of artificial smoke. Rosa turns around and spots me, and I laugh silently when her smile fades. Her stare lingers at my exposed torso and chest, so I rest my palm on the silver handle of the sword that’s hanging on my belt and flex my pecs. Her gaze shoots up to mine, and I smirk, lifting my brow knowingly.

She glares at me, but I’m distracted by a slim brunette dressed in a skimpy nurse costume who gawks at my warrior attire and addresses me before I reach the bar, “Hey, Wade.”

I know you?

“Hey, baby,” I comment, glancing over her shoulder at Rosa, who’s evaluating me in a most disconcerting manner – as if she sees right through me.

Her delicious red lips curve up at a slow pace.
Fuck, last night, she figured out that I call them baby simply because I don’t bother to remember names.

The woman keeps on rambling. Nonetheless, my attention is fixated on Rosa. She’s being offered a drink by Batman. Relieved that she’s too distracted to interfere, I listen to the nurse. Although I can’t help but notice how Rosa’s companion is already buying her a second shot and seems to be concentrating on her cleavage constantly.

I’m not pretending to be any better, but I don’t need an intoxicated woman in my bed. Once we’ve fucked, I want them to leave. Period. No cuddling, no talking, just hard fucking. I’ve loved twice and lost love twice. After Jenny died when she was only sixteen, I tried to find some peace by joining the military; but all the injustice I’ve witnessed has shown me how fucking much love hurts.

While Rosa’s observing me again, she smiles naughtily as the guy whispers something into her ear. She’s flirtatious, enchanting to observe.

Batman tugs her with him, and as she passes us, she says to the nurse, “Ask him to tell you your name,
baby
.”

“What?” the nurse says, puzzled.

I sigh, aiming a scowl at Rosa.

“Do you even remember me? What’s my name?” the nurse inquires.

I’m absorbed in payback. When Rosa keeps walking, I curl my fingers around her biceps, forcing her to stop, and give Batman a warning look to back away. He receives the message and takes off.

“Oh, no you don’t,” I drawl to Rosa, bringing my face close to hers, making her as uncomfortable with this situation as I am.

You started this, now I’m finishing it.

I watch as her delicate throat moves slightly when she swallows – the only indication she’s having second thoughts about taunting me.

Before I get a chance to dig myself out of this awkward position, the nurse with no name pouts and shoves us apart.

“Hey, we were talking!” she snarls, crowding Rosa.

She stands her ground and seems to be entertained by this girl’s tantrum. I, on the other hand, am not. There’s nothing that makes me run away from a woman faster than the usage of
we
. Besides, she should be mad at me, not Rosa. When she gets too close to Rosa, I calmly push the nurse and shift between them.

“Don’t shout at Rosa. You’re causing a scene and making a fool of yourself.
We
are done. Now leave us alone,” I warn her in a low voice.

Offended, she complies.

Rosa is grinning at me, but I’m not pleased with her either. Nevertheless, she doesn’t cower under my glare and remarks wryly, “She seems like fun.”

“He seems to only see your breasts,” I counter and nod in Batman’s direction. “Next time, maybe he can look into your eyes once instead of at your cleavage. You deserve better than that.”

She’s taken aback by my comment for a second but then smiles wider. “Well, they
were
a bit on display.” Glancing down, she touches her luscious breasts to right them in her corset in an unintentionally sexy move.