The Promise

Chapter Twenty-One Firing Line

The phone rang in Benny’s back pocket. He flipped the flaps closed on the box he was sorting through in the basement, pulled his phone out, and saw it was his ma calling.

“Hey, Ma,” he answered.

“Benny, we’re out,” she told him something that he really didn’t need to know.

“She’s out and she dragged my ass with her!” He heard his father shout, which meant wherever they were, everyone heard it.

“Quiet, Vinnie, yeesh,” his ma shushed his pop.

“Ma,” Ben called to get her attention back in hopes of getting this conversation over a lot faster.

“We’re at a furniture shop and we’ve just seen the sweetest bed,” she announced.

“She thinks it’s sweet,” he heard his father yell. “I think it’s girlie.”

“Vinnie, quiet,” his mother snapped.

But Ben knew what this was about. He’d told them Frankie was moving in and he was doing a clear out to prepare for that event.

He’d also, now he saw was stupidly, told them Frankie wanted a guestroom.

“Ma, let Frankie pick the furniture,” he ordered.

“I am,” she returned smartly. “But she needs to see this bed so I need her email address ’cause I’m takin’ a picture of it with my phone. I don’t wanna text it to her. She’s gotta see it bigger, in all its glory.”

Ben gave a moment’s thought to the kind of redecorating Frankie would undoubtedly instigate in his house. These thoughts included the muted colors, candles, minimal knickknacks, and photos she decorated her apartment in. Since he liked all that, he quit thinking about it.

What he did not think was that any bed his mother picked would be something Frankie would want. It was a surprise, but when it came to her home, Francesca Concetti wasn’t about flash but was about taste and minimization. Theresa Bianchi decorated in bulk, with a heavy dose of Catholicism.

Still, he gave his mother her email. A bonus of having Frankie, she could deal with his ma when she got like this. He felt no guilt about that. He was going have to put up with her whacked family, she was going to have to put up with his family’s brand of whacked.

This was something, he’d noted repeatedly, that she not only had no problem doing, she actually liked doing it.

“Do you want your father to come over and help with the basement this weekend?” she asked, taking him out of his pleasant thoughts.

“Workin’ on it now, Ma. And goin’ to Brownsburg this weekend.”

“Oh, right, of course,” she muttered. “Do you want me to send your father over there now?”

Vinnie Senior popping the cap on a beer, finding a sturdy box to sit on, and bossing his ass around for two hours?

No. He didn’t want that.

“I’m good,” he answered.

“You sure?” she pushed, and he sighed.

“Yeah, Ma, I’m sure.”

“Boy, deliver me!” his father yelled over him talking, and Ben looked at his feet and shook his head.

“Okay, you need us, call,” his ma ignored his pop, and gratefully ended it.

“Later, Ma.”

“’Bye, Benny.”

He disconnected, shoved his phone back in his pocket, and moved to another box. He was finding the ex-owners of his house left him mostly junk. Some was good enough that he’d call the Salvation Army to pick it up. The rest he’d take to the dump.

That said, this was not going to be a day’s job. It would take at least a week and he was not looking forward to it.

What he was looking forward to was not having to drive down to Frankie’s every few weeks or waiting for her to come to him. He wanted this. She wanted this. He wanted her to make his house hers. So he was doing what he could so she could do that.

He got through two more boxes before his phone rang again. He pulled it out, expecting it’d be his mother having seen another piece of furniture, or God knew what, this time something she wanted him to see. This was something that could happen easily when his mother was out doing anything.

Not for the first time he was understanding Carm’s play of moving all the way across the country.

But his display said, Sal Calling.

He put his cell to his ear and greeted, “Yo, Sal.”

“Where are you?” Sal barked, and Ben’s back shot straight.

“In my basement,” he answered, not feeling good feelings about Sal’s greeting.

Sal was talking to someone else when he ordered, “Get him to put someone on her and you drive down now.”

Ben took the punch to the heart those words caused and he did it moving quickly to his dog, who was lying on his back, four paws in the air, sleeping on a pile of rags Ben had tossed in the corner. Gus was out because Gus had attacked every attackable item in the basement, and there were a fair few of them, and he’d engaged in this activity for a solid hour.

Benny bent, scooped up Gus, who jumped with surprise in his arm, then immediately started wriggling, ready for play, even right out of sleep. But Ben had to ignore it for once as he headed to the stairs.

He did all this demanding, “Talk to me.”

“Word’s shiftin’ through Indy. A man lookin’ for someone to do a hit for him. Easy job. Some computer kid who works for Wyler Pharmaceuticals. He’s in a hurry this time and doesn’t mind local. He’s also found local.”

Jesus, what the fuck was happening where Frankie worked?

“You are fuckin’ shittin’ me,” Ben growled, making it to his kitchen.

“I’m not. Got that, but yesterday, I got more.”

Fucking brilliant.

More.

“What?” Benny bit out.

“PI down there, sleazebag and middleman for a variety of shit, he’s got himself a job trailin’ some boy who’s boinking his secretary. Guess where that boy works?”

“What the fuck?” Ben clipped, now taking the stairs to his second floor two at a time.

“This shit is not good shit, whatever this shit is. But I do not know what this shit is and I do not like that. So I’m gonna find out. I also know two hits called on two folks who work where Frankie works, this PI—who is not a good guy, Benny, he’s a piece of shit—if he’s involved, I’m not likin’ this at all. I got friends down there. They’ll put a man on Frankie until my boy gets down there to take over.”

Ben stopped dead in his bedroom. “Why’re you doin’ that?”

“Why?” Sal clipped. “’Cause this is Frankie. She could be standin’ in a field in the middle of the day and a dead body would drop on her.”

He was not wrong.

Frankie got born into a family who bounced her around, didn’t give that first shit about her, and caused her headaches to that day. Her first and only real boyfriend before Benny got involved with the mob, then was murdered. Her play for redemption with his family got her shot. Now she had a job where people were getting whacked.

Fuck.

“Why is the computer guy a target?” Ben asked.

“No fuckin’ clue,” Sal answered.

“You know if Frankie knows him?”

“Nope, but I do know the boy who’s bangin’ his secretary has a job title just like Frankie’s, ’cept it says ‘west’ and not ‘east.’”

“A close colleague,” Ben muttered, making a decision. He put Gus on the floor and went to his closet. He pulled out the bag that had seen a lot of use the last months, telling Sal, “I’m gonna be on the road, headed down there in ten minutes.”

“Got a boy already on his way, Benny. He’ll trail her everywhere, keep an eye. You got the restaurant.”

“No disrespect, Sal, and I mean it this time, but I’m not a big fan of one of your boys trailin’ Frankie.”

“You think she’ll make him?” Sal asked, and Benny’s brows shot together.

“You weren’t gonna tell her this shit’s goin’ down?” Ben asked back.

“Fuck no, figlio. She knows this, she’ll stick her nose in. She’s in that field and that body that drops on her?” he asked, but he did it not wanting an answer. “It’d be a friend she was helping.”

He had a point.

Ben tossed his bag on the bed. “That’s not why I don’t want one of your men on her.”

“He’ll take care of her, Benny.”

“That’d be my job,” Ben returned.

Sal was silent.

Ben wasn’t.

“Explain to me your take on this.”

“Got no take,” Sal replied. “All I know is that it’s not good and Frankie’s in the firing line.”

That was Benny’s take.

“She’s got a guy who works with her, forgot his first name but last name’s Bierman,” Ben told him. “He’s a dick and Frankie says he’s targeting her boss for a takedown.”

“Another hit?”

Fucking hell, the world Sal lived in.

“Office politics, Sal.”

“Oh,” he muttered. “Right.”

“To get to her boss, he’s got his eyes on Frankie and her colleague,” Ben told him. “You got a name behind the ordered hit?”

“Don’t work that way, Benny. Only thing exchanged is money and the name of the guy goin’ down.”

“What’s the name of the guy goin’ down?”

“Peter Furlock.”

“You got a guy on him?”

“Don’t give a fuck about him.”

He’d grabbed shit from his drawer and was tossing it into his bag when he told Sal, “I gotta call the cops on this, Sal.”

“You cannot do that, Benito Bianchi.”

Ben went solid at his tone.

“I got my name all over Indy askin’ these questions,” Sal stated in a cold voice. “You put the cops on this, they stick their noses in, me askin’ around, one and one will make two, and that’ll fuck me. Don’t got a lot of business in Indy, but the business I got and the relationships I got I wanna keep. I ask around about somethin’ the cops get wind of and move on, my name takes the kind of hit I don’t like. I love you, figlio, but no one fucks me, even you.”

Goddammit!

He should never have asked Sal to get involved. He knew it. Problem was, this was about Frankie, it was important, and he had no one else to ask.

“Then you put a man on that guy,” Ben returned.

Sal was silent.

“Sal, put a man on that guy or we got problems,” Ben said quietly. “I do not want to have problems with you for obvious reasons. And I do not want to have problems with you for Frankie.”

“I’m pretty sure it hasn’t escaped your attention that I’m not in the business of doin’ good deeds.”

“Get in it for Frankie,” Benny replied.

“How in the firing line is she?” Sal asked.

“I don’t know what’s goin’ down with these hits, Sal, but I figure from what she’s told me, the PI was likely hired by Bierman. This could mean he’s got the same on Frankie. The hits, I’ve got no clue. The PI, it fits.”

“Right,” Sal prompted when Benny took a breath.

“There’s weird shit happening with this guy that’s beyond office politics,” Ben kept going. “I’ve never worked in an office, but it seems way over the top to hire a PI to find dirt on some random member of the team in order to take out a bigger fish. Frankie’s keepin’ clear, outside of cataloging all the weird shit that’s happening. Her assistant is not. She’s stickin’ her nose in with a posse of other women who probably don’t like this guy and wanna see his ass canned, but are maybe puttin’ themselves in harm’s way.”

“Detail, Benny.”

“I don’t have it.”

“Get it,” Sal ordered. “Get down to Frankie. You take her ass, I’ll take Furlock’s ass. And you want me to solve this quiet-like, you keep your ass in that ’burg and you just became a Giglia foot soldier.”

Ben’s throat started burning and he growled, “That shit’s not happening.”

“In my brand-new good deeds department, Benny,” Sal said on a sigh.

Benny drew in a deep breath.

Then he made another decision.

“I gotta make some calls about the restaurant. I gotta pack more shit. Then I’m on the road. In the meantime, you find out if she’s got a PI on her.”

“Done. You get info, call me.”

“Done.”

“Take your gun, Benny,” Sal advised.

Fuck.

“You got a bad feeling,” Ben guessed quietly.

“About Frankie? Don’t know. About whatever this shit is? Yes. Definitely,” Sal confirmed.

“Right. Later, Sal.”

“Later, figlio. And Benny?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re a good man.”

Great.

He had approval from Salvatore Giglia.

Sal disconnected.

Ben went to find a bigger bag.

***

“What?” Frankie asked on a muted scream thirty minutes later when Ben was in his SUV, heading down to the ’burg. He’d called Frankie to tell her he was coming for an extended visit.

She sounded partly freaked, mostly excited.

He liked the excited, wasn’t big on the freaked, and more, wasn’t big on the fact that when she found out why he was coming down, that freaked would get freaked.

“I’m headed your way. I’ll be at your place around the time you’ll be at your place and I’ll explain everything when I see you.”

She sounded a lot less excited and now quietly freaked when she asked, “Explain everything about what?”

“Babe, I’ll tell you when I see you.”

“Is everything okay?”

Absolutely not.

“I’ll see you in a few hours and explain it to you then.”

“Is Theresa okay?” she pushed.

“Yes,” he answered.

“Vinnie?”

“Yes, honey.”

“Manny and Sela?”

“Everyone’s okay, Frankie,” he said patiently. “There’s just somethin’ you need to know and somethin’ I need to do.”

She gave him a beat of silence before she stated, “This is weird, Benny.”

“I know, baby. But I’m not sayin’ anything while you’re at work. A few hours, you’ll have the story.”

“While I’m at work?” she asked leadingly.

“Babe,” he said a lot less patiently. “I’ll. Explain. Everything. When I see you.”

“Yeesh, Ben. Come on. You’re bein’ mystery man. I’m gonna be curious,” she replied.

Ben sighed.

“Oh shit,” she muttered.

“What?”

“I’m going out with Cheryl tonight.”

“Not anymore.”

“Ben, honey, she’s lookin’ forward to this.”

“She can look forward to it another night.”

“I love you. I want to see you. I’ve been away from you not three days and I’m freakin’ thrilled I’m gonna go home and you’ll be there, or I’ll be there and you’ll be there right after me. But she’s a sister. You don’t tell a sister who needs to get laid you can’t be her wingman, bagging on her last-minute.”

“You cannot be serious,” Ben stated, hoping she was not.

“I totally am.” Her voice lowered when she finished, “I’m sorry, honey. Hopefully she’ll hook up fast and I’ll get home early.”

Ben made another decision. “I’m comin’ with.”

“Holy crap, you can’t do that,” she returned immediately, sounding shocked. “I can’t be a wingman with my boyfriend with me.”

Ben clenched his teeth.

Then he said, “We’ll talk about this later too.”

She read his tone and he knew it when she replied, “Probably a good idea.”

“Leave at five, babe.”

“Like you’re headed down here and I’ll kick back and clean out my inbox,” she murmured.

“Frankie?” he called.

“What?” she answered.

“The answer to ‘leave at five, babe’ is ‘all right, honey,’” he informed her.

“Annoying,” she muttered.

At that, he grinned.

Then he said, “See you soon.”

“All right, honey.”

At that, he chuckled.

And after he told her he loved her and got it in return, he disconnected.

***

Ben had just let himself into Frankie’s place, minimized the devastation Gus could make by putting him in her guestroom, got a beer and was taking a tug, when he dropped his chin and the bottle and caught sight through her living room window of her Z sliding into her parking space.

He put the beer on her bar, headed to her door and through it, and the instant he came out from the recess of her front door, he saw her stop walking from her Z and start skip-running.

On heels.

Fucking Frankie.

He smiled.

She smiled back, threw herself in his arms, and banged him hard with her computer bag on his bicep.

“Oh, sorry,” she whispered, her face close to his.

He said nothing.

This was because he didn’t give a fuck about her bag hitting him, but he did give a fuck about the fact that her mouth was close.

So he ignored the first and took advantage of the second.

He broke the clinch, took her bag from her, then took her hand and pulled her into her apartment.

She threw her keys on the table by the door and moved in, turning the second she cleared the entryway, saying, “Well?”

“You wanna get changed?” he asked, bending to set her bag on the floor against the wall by the table.

He also saw she was wearing spike-heeled slingback pumps and another business-type dress, high neck, short sleeves, black.

Skintight.

Short.

Jesus.

“I wanna know why I got a Benny Bianchi surprise visit,” she answered.

“You wanna get a beer first?”

“I already answered that question.”

“You wanna let me get my beer and relax after the drive, seein’ as I got here about five minutes before you?”

“Benny,” she snapped.

“Not even ten seconds, baby,” he said softly, moving toward the kitchen and right to his bottle of beer.

She didn’t follow, just pivoted, so when he took a pull and turned to her, she was facing him.

“Well?” she repeated.

“A while ago, I did something.”

Her body went still and there was a look on her face he didn’t get and couldn’t read. It was the first time in a long time she gave him a look he couldn’t read. Especially one like this one.

One that was not good.

“What’d you do?” she asked.

“You told me that guy in your company got whacked, so I went to Sal to see if he could find out who did it and maybe find out why.”

He could read her face then. Her eyes got huge and her mouth dropped open.

She snapped it shut to ask, “You went to Sal?”

“Yep.”

“For a favor?”

“He and Gina are invited to our wedding.”

At that, her face got soft, her eyes warmed, and the tenseness in her body loosened so much, he braced to catch her if she folded to the floor.

“Our wedding?” she asked softly.

That’s when he got the reaction.

“You might wanna shack up for the rest of our lives, but I don’t wanna put up with Ma’s shit if we do somethin’ like that,” he replied. “Not to mention, I want a lifetime of catching sight of my rings on your finger. So yeah, that’s where we’re heading. Our wedding.”

That got him love and marvel, like she couldn’t believe he was real and she couldn’t believe her luck, and he fucking loved that. Loved it.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t take advantage of it in that moment.

“I think I wanna kiss you all over,” she said quietly, and he grinned, preferring her to do that but needing to get this shit done first.

“You wanna know what this is all about?” he asked.

“Okay, I think I wanna kiss you all over after you tell me what this is all about,” she amended, and his grin grew into a smile.

He felt it fade when he shared, “Not sure you’re gonna be in that mood when I’m done, baby.”

“Oh shit,” she replied.

“You wanna sit down?” he offered.

“Do I need to sit down?”

“My guess? Definitely. With a beer. At least.”

“Oh shit,” she repeated.

“Sit down, cara. I’ll get you your beer.”

She gave him a long look, then moved to her couch. A big, overstuffed, pillowy, muted green couch that was unbelievably comfortable and would look great in his living room with her muted blue, overstuffed, pillowy armchair and ottoman. Not to mention switching out her ace square coffee table with his beaten-up rectangular one. Partly because it was ace, partly because it wasn’t beaten-up, but mostly because it was bigger and would hold a lot more shit, like beer bottles and bags of chips.

He was nixing her purple wingback chair, mostly because it was purple and partly because he was keeping his recliner.

When he came to her with her opened beer, she was in that muted green couch, shoes off, legs curled underneath her.

He gave her the beer, sat down next to her, and shoved his fingers in the bend of her knee, yanking her closer and keeping his hand there.

“You know a guy named Peter Furlock?” he asked, and her brows drew together as her head tilted to the side.

“No.”

“He works at Wyler Pharmaceuticals.”

“Okay,” she replied slowly, her gaze turning alert and her body again getting wired.

“He’s a computer guy and Sal found out he’s had a hit put out on him.”

She gasped, her eyes going huge in a way that was still cute but he didn’t like as much, and she cried, “Oh my God, Benny!”

“Yeah,” he agreed.

“Did you call the cops?”

He drew in breath, held her eyes, and answered, “I can’t, baby. Sal got this intel. Sal put himself and his name out there to get it. We don’t know what’s goin’ on or who’s behind it. The hit isn’t interrupted by anyone but Sal, Sal is gonna be vulnerable, and Sal doesn’t like to be vulnerable.”

“Shit,” she mumbled, getting it. Then she focused intently on him and asked slowly, “And you’re okay with that?”

“I’m okay with it ’cause Sal’s lookin’ after this Furlock guy. He’s also lookin’ into this whole situation fully. And if I wasn’t okay with it, then Sal wouldn’t be okay with me, and I’m about two months away from bein’ really fuckin’ happy. I don’t need that shit, but more, we don’t need it.”

She looked worried. “Do you think he’ll take care of this Peter guy?”

“I think Sal would not make me live with a decision he’s gotta know I didn’t like very much and let this Peter guy swing.”

“Okay, I…okay…” She shook her head. “I don’t get it. What’s going on?”

“Sal doesn’t get it either. But he’s goin’ to and I’m gonna help.”

“What?” she whispered.

“Your colleague, the guy who does the East Coast sales, he’s bangin’ his secretary.”

Her eyes went huge again as she breathed, “How do you know that?”

He cocked his head to the side. “You know that?”

“No, I was guessing,” she told him.

“Were you guessing in a way that anyone around could make that guess?” he asked.

“Probably. They’re not out about it, but body language and the time they spend together screams it.”

“Is that frowned on in the company?”

“Well, I was pretty good at reading my employee handbook when I started, Ben, but I didn’t memorize it. That said, even if it wasn’t against policy, it’s still frowned on.”

“If Bierman has that on your sales guy for the East, does he have leverage over him?”

Her hand lifted to her mouth, and through it, she said, “Oh my God.”

That meant yes.

He studied her and decided to lay the easy fix on her.

“Frankie, baby, this sucks. I hate sayin’ it to you, but the entire drive down, I’ve been tryin’ to think about the best way to end this for you, to get you safe, and that best way is you got no choice but to quit.”

Her hand dropped. “What?”

“Babe, that place is a mess, a bad one—hits-taken-out-on-people bad. You gotta get the fuck out.”

“But I need a job, Benny.”

“Work at the restaurant until you find one.” Her eyes started to get squinty so Ben gave her knee a yank to make his point, even as he said, “Francesca, your co-workers are getting investigated by PIs for doin’ the dirty with their secretaries and hits are being taken out on them. You got…to get…the fuck out.”

“It’s Tenrix,” she said absurdly.

“Come again?” he asked, and she scooted even closer to him, her knee on his thigh, her hand on his chest.

“Listen, Benny, what I know is, Bierman is obsessed with Tenrix, the product we’re launching at the end of the year. He’s gung ho on the salespeople pushing it and it hasn’t even been launched. My boss is not letting him get up in our shit about it and he’s also pushing him to get information that couldn’t be found on the servers about the product. The information was finally handed over, but the files might have been tampered with. The lead scientist on that projected was murdered, a professional hit for what seems like no reason. And now some random IT guy has a hit out on him.”

“You’re tellin’ me this because…?” he prompted.

“I’m tellin’ you this because I’m thinking that IT guy is the guy who was talking with Tandy and the other girls in the parking lot the day I told her to stand down and advise the others to do the same. They didn’t look like they were discussing where they were going to have a drink after they all decided to stop sticking their noses into shit. They looked like they were discussing the shit they had their noses into.”

“So she didn’t stand down,” Ben noted. “Like I said before, babe, her consequences.”

She shook her head and got closer.

“No, Ben, what I’m sayin’ is, the IT guy might be able to ascertain if the files were tampered with. And if he has access to the servers and backups, he might be able to get his hands on the original files.”

“Babe, I’ll say it again, this is not your problem or your business, and it would be less of your business if you quit and came home to Chicago.”

“Benny,” she said quietly. “You aren’t gettin’ me. Important files about a pharmaceutical product that’s soon to be launched have been tampered with. The scientist heading the project is dead.” She got even closer. “Ben, I think there’s something we don’t know about Tenrix, and there shouldn’t be anything you don’t know about a drug. In development phase, everything is strictly confidential. But once it’s out there, it has to be transparent. And the only thing to hide about a drug that’s imminently being rolled out is that drug is dangerous.”

He stared at her. “Who would hide shit like that?”

“Bierman, the director of research and development, who might get a rather hefty bonus for a successful launch of a product and who has been backing this product for years.”

“Putting unknown numbers of people who take that drug at risk?” Benny asked, unable to wrap his head around someone doing something that unbelievably dickish.

“It’s highly likely the side effects that are dangerous don’t occur in the entirety of the subjects that took it or they wouldn’t be able to hide it. It’s probably that it happens very rarely and only came out in the later phases of the trials, which could mean the longer the drug is taken, that’s when the adverse effect is experienced. And at this juncture, dumping Tenrix, the loss of capital on that product would be colossal.”

“That makes it okay?” Ben pushed.

“No,” Frankie answered. “But for someone like Bierman, it might make it worth the risk.”

“The FDA has to approve that shit, Frankie.”

“Yeah,” she agreed. “But what did they approve?”

“Fuck,” Benny whispered, getting what she was saying.

“If that drug is dangerous, Ben, I can’t let it launch.”

Fuck.

There it was. Frankie getting a wild hair and wanting to get involved.

“You’re not stickin’ your nose in this,” he stated.

Her eyes got wide again, and this time, it was in a way he absolutely did not like.

“So I leave, turn my back on this, Bierman succeeds in getting Tenrix launched, and people in a couple of months of taking that drug, or a couple of years, or a couple of decades, suffer unknown consequences? Consequences that were worth quashing data and two men getting dead?”

“I thought you said your boss has his own concerns.”

“Yeah, but you blow the whistle on something like this, you gotta prove there’s been a foul on the play. You can’t make allegations without anything concrete backing it.”

“So let him find the concrete.”

“What if he doesn’t?”

He turned to her and shot back, “And what if you do?” He lifted a hand, curled it around her neck, and yanked her closer so they were near nose-to-nose. “This guy is desperate enough for this drug to go through, he’s killin’ people and you’re already on the firing line ’cause he wants to take down your boss who’s askin’ questions. You get involved in a deeper way, what will he do?”

Her eyes slid to either side before coming back to his when she announced, “That’s where you and Sal come in.”

He dropped his hand and sat back in the couch, resting his head on the top to look at the ceiling, before he muttered, “Fuck me.”

He lifted his head when he felt Frankie positioning to straddle his lap, something she set her beer aside and yanked her skirt up to do. A dirty play since he liked her there too much, he liked her skirt up around her hips more, she knew it, and she hadn’t even started talking yet.

Then she started talking.

“I’d like to talk to Lloyd, but I can’t. Not yet. Not this early. I’d like to talk to Colt, but I can’t do that either without throwing Sal under the bus. So what I have to do is talk to Tandy, speed shit up, get just enough that it won’t make it look like seriously nasty office politics if I go to Lloyd with my concerns about Bierman. It can’t be hard to find. Nurses worked on those trials all over the country. There have to be witnesses, data, files, and not all on a computer. This drug has been in testing for ages. There has to be something.”

He looked into her eyes and stated, “You do know that I carried you through a forest with you bleedin’ from a gunshot wound.”

“I know,” she replied gently.

“So you know I kinda don’t want a repeat performance of that.”

Her face was soft when she said, “Sal and you’ll keep me safe.”

He curled his fingers around her hips and informed her, “This is not a smart play, Frankie.”

She lifted her hands to hold him on either side of his neck and she returned, “This is the only play, Ben. People’s health is at stake.”

He stared at her, thinking she was right. If that was a possibility, it’d be a dick move to walk away and hope someone else would deal with it.

But Frankie was not that kind of person. If that was a possibility, and it sounded like it was, she’d never walk away.

So now she was walking right into that field.

But it was Ben’s job, working with fucking Salvatore Giglia, to make certain a dead body didn’t drop on her.

Or far fucking worse, her beautiful body dropping.

He kept staring at her, thinking he’d like to bring Cal in on this. He and Vi would be home from their honeymoon in three days.

But people were getting whacked; Cal was a new husband, new father.

He couldn’t bring Cal into this.

It was Sal. Sal and Benny.

Fuck.

“I don’t like this,” he told her.

“It won’t take long,” she replied. “I think Tandy’s crew has laid the groundwork.” She leaned into him. “And it might turn out to be nothing. It might not be Bierman and Tenrix. It might be he’s just a massive dick. It might be the hits have nothing to do with this or each other. It might just be Wyler has bad luck and attracts crazy people, and then I’ll have another decision to make ’cause I won’t want to work for a place like that, even from a home office in Chicago.”

Ben kept staring at her, knowing that was not in the realm of possibility. The company was big, but there were too many coincidences. It had to fit together.

He just didn’t want Frankie being the one to fit it together.

Even so, knowing his baby, he had no choice.

So he said, “You make no move without me knowin’ about it.”

She grinned, bent in, and touched her mouth to his, a light in her eyes he did not like and her body wired a different way.

No fear. All in. Raring to go.

Fucking Frankie.

Moving back, she said softly, “Okay.”

“I gotta fill Sal in on all this shit.”

She nodded and repeated, “Okay.”

“I’m close for the long haul,” he told her, and her head tipped to the side.

“What about the restaurant?”

“Pop and Manny are on it.”

“Is that gonna be okay?” she asked.

“My other choice is…?” he asked back.

“Well…Sal,” she answered, and his fingers dug into her hips.

“I keep you safe.”

That got him another soft look before she whispered, “My Benny.” Then suddenly, her head jerked and she asked, “What did you do with Gus?”

“Put him in your second bedroom when I got here.”

Her eyes got huge again, this time in a way he liked, and she asked loudly, “You brought him?”

“Not gonna leave him behind for an indeterminate stay with Mrs. Zambino. He might forget who’s payin’ for his puppy chow.”

“Oh my God!” she cried, and he lost her straddling his lap since she jumped off and ran toward the hall.

Ben let his head drop back to the couch and, again, looked at the ceiling, wondering if he’d gone insane.

He turned his head to the side and saw Frankie come in, cuddling and cooing at Gus, no shoes, skintight, sexy, don’t-fuck-with-me business dress (that in about five minutes he was going to peel off of her), her mane of hair pulled back at the top, wild with curls at the bottom, and he knew he hadn’t gone insane.

He’d gone and got himself pussy-whipped.

“I haven’t paid a pet deposit,” she announced.

“That gonna be a problem?” he asked in reply, and she gave him a huge smile.

“No, seein’ as I have no qualms with them evicting me early.”

He liked that answer a fuckuva lot so he ordered, “Come here, Frankie.”

“Though, they do, while I instigate my heretofore unmined sleuth powers to uncover probably highly felonious acts at a major, multinational pharmaceutical company, the commute is gonna be a bitch.”

“Come here, Francesca.”

She again tipped her head to the side. “Has Gus been walked?”

Fuck.

He hadn’t.

Ben folded out of the couch and ordered, “Go get some flip-flops.”

“I can walk him in heels.”

He cut his eyes to her. “You put those heels on to walk Gus, you’ll find yourself ass to the hood of the first car we pass, giving your neighbors a show. You want to give your man a break from all that”—he threw a hand her way—“you put on flip-flops and I might be able to control it until I get you and our dog back through the front door.”

She grinned her I-have-a-secret-and-I-wanna-moan-it-in-your-ear grin and replied, “I’ll get some flip-flops.”

“Good call,” he muttered.

She bent to put Gus to the floor, torturing Benny by giving him a direct view of her ass with her tight skirt stretching tighter, thankfully straightened, turned, and walked back toward the hall.

Gus looked at Benny, then down the hall toward Frankie and immediately started waddle-trotting after her.

She came out in flip-flops, got some plastic bags just in case, and they took Gus for a walk.

After, Ben made it all the way to her bed before he peeled off her dress.

Twenty-five minutes later, when he made her come, she moaned her secret into his ear.

It consisted of three words.

“Love you, Benny.”

***

“My turn!” Frankie announced when Ben came back from the bathroom at J&J’s Saloon and approached where Cheryl and Frankie were sitting.

She laid a hard but quick one on him that obliterated any possibility of wingman status (not that it wasn’t already gone since he was there), grinned into his face, then part-walked, part-strutted, and part-bounced to the back where the bathrooms were.

She did this with every male eye in the joint following her ass covered in the tight skirt of her dress, or her long legs that were bare and led into a pair of hot-as-hell heels.

So although Benny appreciated the view, it was also irritating as fuck.

“You’re a new breed of badass,” Cheryl noted, taking his attention to her.

“Come again?” he asked, seeing she was studying him closely.

“Not the show-up-and-demand-to-go-out-with-your-woman-to-make-sure-she-doesn’t-get-into-trouble move. That’s not a new breed of badass, that’s the usual one. The after-she-gets-shot-let-her-stick-her-neck-out-and-do-it-with-the-Chicago-mob-at-her-back move.”

Jesus Christ.

Frankie told this woman what was going down? How long was he in the goddamned bathroom?

His stomach tightening, he slid in front of her, did it holding her eyes, necessarily and intentionally getting close because there was no room, but also because he had a point to make.

“She shouldn’t have told you,” he said low.

“No shit?” she asked in return.

He didn’t reply to that.

He ordered, “And you aren’t gonna say dick to anyone.”

Her eyes narrowed.

He’d been around Cheryl once before, at Vi and Cal’s wedding.

Frankie called her edgy.

Benny and any other man who took one look at her would call her hard.

When she met them at J&J’s, reminded of that hardness and seeing it without her in a bridesmaid gown, happy her girl was happy, Ben understood this was why she wasn’t getting laid.

Men didn’t like hard. They liked soft. They didn’t mind attitude and there were those, like Benny, who wanted that. Some men could get off on the challenge of smoothing out sharp edges, or knowing that was what a woman gave out in the world, but when he got her home, she gave him the sweet underneath.

But Cheryl was straight-up hard. Her eyes said “you are not getting in there no matter what you try, so don’t bother trying.” And everything about her said she’d take what she wanted, and if you got anything out of that, she didn’t give a fuck. This would mean you wouldn’t get anything out of that except maybe an orgasm, but not a good one.

This woman wasn’t about exploring the possibility of building a future or just having a good time and some laughs.

This woman was about riding you hard until she found it, climbing off even if you hadn’t, getting dressed, and going home.

The loyalty she gained from Vi and now Frankie made him wonder what made her like that and why she didn’t put out what she gave to her girls in order to at least get laid and at most find herself a man.

“You do not know me, but I am no dumbfuck,” she said in a voice cold as ice, proving his thoughts true.

“I figure you aren’t, I’m just remindin’ you not to be.”

She ignored that and stated, “But you do know your woman so you know she isn’t one either. If she couldn’t trust me, she wouldn’t have said squat.”

She was right.

But the stakes were high.

“She’s playin’ with fire,” he pointed out.

“Then don’t let her get burned,” she shot back.

“And I’m doin’ that by makin’ sure you know to keep your mouth shut and don’t do somethin’ stupid like thinkin’ you can help your girl by makin’ this a Laverne & Shirley scenario.”

Her eyes slid to the side.

Jesus.

“Which one are you?” he asked, and her eyes came back. “Laverne or Shirley?”

“I know a guy who’s ace at surveillance,” she told him, chin lifting slightly.

She was Laverne.

“There it is,” he muttered, looking away and reaching for his beer.

“And you should be involved, a guy who owns a pizzeria?”

He took a pull off his beer in an effort not to allow that remark to irritate him before he reminded her, “She sleeps at my side.”

“And my mom’s got high blood pressure. Takes meds for it.”

Benny shook his head. “Cheryl, I got a man in Chicago who got the story of what I could give him while my woman was gettin’ sexed up to go out for drinks with her girl, and in doin’ that, tease every guy here, none of ’em who are ever gonna get close to tappin’ her ass, all of ’em wantin’ to, and all of that annoying the fuck outta me. And this man has resources. Your surveillance guy might be tight, but I’m thinkin’ my guy has that covered.”

Suddenly, she grinned, and if he had a vagina, he would advise her to turn that grin to the room because it was almost cute, definitely playful, and showed she had a sense of humor. All of this in a way that, with her big hair, nice tits, and show of skin, would mean her dry spell would end in about the time it would take to walk back to the bathrooms or get to a car.

“I see your point,” she said through her grin.

“Thrilled, babe,” he muttered around his bottle of beer before he took another pull and moved to sit on Frankie’s stool.

She sucked back some of her cocktail.

When she did, Benny threw her a hint. “Just sayin’, might be good you troll for talent in a bar that’s not the bar where you work.”

She looked at him.

“Yeah. I see that. Problem is, I make some cake here, but it’s the only bar close. I’m not about to get nailed for drinkin’ and drivin’ so I cab it when I hit the scene. And me payin’ hefty cab fares means I can’t buy six packets of Oreos for my boy every week ’cause that kid eats the whole damn thing the minute I take it out of the bag.”

Another thing that would make her a winner if a man knew about it: she gave more of a shit about getting her kid Oreos than getting herself laid.

“Then maybe you should widen the net and not just fish in bars,” Benny suggested, and her head jerked in surprise.

“Like where?”

Shit, he walked right into a discussion he did not want to be in and it was a discussion with no exit door.

“I don’t know,” he answered. “What kinda man you want?”

“A man who looks good, fucks better, and likes kids.” She gave him her limited wish list and tipped her head to the side. “Got any friends?”

“You willin’ to move to Chicago?”

“No.”

“Then no.”

She gave him another grin, even as she told him, “Just to say, you’re crampin’ my style.”

He glanced through the bar that wasn’t packed, but it wasn’t a slow night either, then looked back to her. “Anyone here you’re even remotely interested in?”

“No.”

“Then let me buy you a drink and you tell me about your boy.”

Her grin turned into a smile at the mention of her boy, a smile that, if she put it out there, might get her more than just laid, just as Frankie came back, asking, “I miss any action?”

Benny started to make a move to give her back her stool, but she made her move faster, sliding in in a way that forced him to shift a thigh and twist on the stool so she could press her hip and side to his crotch and chest between his legs that were up, feet on the rungs of the stool.

Much better than him standing behind her on the stool, pressed to her back.

“No action,” Cheryl answered. “Night’s a dud.”

“Yo, babe.” They all heard.

Ben was about to twist his neck to look, but he didn’t when he saw something flicker over Cheryl’s face when she heard the voice and her eyes shifted beyond Frankie.

It was only there a second, but he caught it, and if he wasn’t mistaken, it was pain. The kind you get when you want something you can’t ever have, you know it, you’re resigned to it, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less.

“Yo, Merry,” Cheryl replied, and Ben finally looked to the good-looking, tall, dark-haired man who stopped at their sides. “Merry, this is Frankie and Benny,” she went on. “Kids, this is Garrett Merrick. J&J’s regular. Detective at the BPD. Decent guy, as far as I can tell, who can hold his liquor and is smart enough to laugh at my jokes.”

“Jesus, Cher, you wanna share my shoe size?” Merrick asked, smiling down at her in a friendly way that said that was all it was. Friends. He had zero interest in getting in there.

“Shoe size ten,” Cheryl stated, turning to look at Frankie and Benny.

“One off,” Merrick muttered, and Cheryl looked back at him.

“Which direction?” she asked.

“Not sayin’.” he answered.

She rolled her eyes to the ceiling. “Please, God, for all my sisters, make it one size up.”

Merrick burst out laughing. So did Frankie. But Ben just chuckled and he did it feeling shit.

And he felt shit because she was a good woman. A hard one, but a good one. And now she was a good one going out of her way to be funny because she liked this guy, but knew he was not the kind of man who had an interest in taking on whatever shit made her hard. He preferred soft. She had no shot, it didn’t enter his mind, and him being a regular meant she read that on him every time he showed. So she was grasping on to all she could get.

Friendship and making him laugh.

Merrick took his mind off these thoughts when he greeted them both, ordered his beer, and joined them, standing close to Cheryl, shooting the shit with her, laughing at her jokes, giving shit back, and generally torturing her not having that first clue he was doing it.

An hour later, Merrick took off, Cheryl announced she had to go home or find a place to sell a kidney in order to pay her babysitter, and Ben loaded both women into his SUV so Cheryl wouldn’t have to pay for a taxi.

When he stopped in the driveway of her crackerbox house, which was crackerbox but still tidy and well cared for, he put his truck in neutral and angled out, even as Cheryl was saying her good-byes.

He caught Frankie’s eyes and said, “Walkin’ her to her door. Safe inside. Be back.”

That got him her look that said he’d fulfilled a promise he didn’t even know he was giving as her lips said, “Okay, honey.”

He grinned at her, closed the door, and rounded the hood, meeting Cheryl on the short, cement walk that led to her front door, a walk that was trimmed on each side with a thick, bushy, healthy line of what looked from the outside light to be little white flowers mixed with purple ones.

Probably not making enough cake to hire a gardener, he knew she did that and that was surprising.

It also said a lot about her that no man who would look at her would know.

“I can make it to my front door, you know,” she muttered, sounding vaguely annoyed.

“Figure you can,” was all the answer he gave her.

They made it to her short stoop, she opened the screen door, then the inside door, and that was when he stopped her.

“Smile,” he said, and her head tipped back to look up at him.

“What?”

“You are far from hard to look at. You smile and mean it, that ups significantly. You wanna get some, let a guy in. And to do that, all you gotta do is smile.”

She studied him before she said, like she was talking to herself, “Definitely a different breed of badass.”

He didn’t comment on that.

He said, “You give what you give to your girls, the love you got for your son, your sense of humor and whatever drives you to plant little flowers along your walk to some guy, Merrick’ll see you givin’ it and he’ll kick his own ass.”

Her lips parted, her face softened, and Ben instantly bent closer to her.

“That, Cheryl. Give that right there and a guy will get lucky, and not the way you want him to think he’ll be. The way he’ll just be, he gets that from you.”

Her face closed down and she stated, “Gave a guy that and I’ll hand you the understatement of the year that the results were not pretty.”

Benny figured as much.

So he straightened and shrugged. “Your call. But heads up, at our age, guys are no longer all about pussy. They want a woman they know can give them a smile like you got and the promise of what’s behind it.”

“I work in a bar, Ben, I know that shit’s not true,” she returned.

“Then you either got an eye for assholes or you aren’t payin’ attention. And, looks of Merrick, I’ll tell you straight up, it’s you not payin’ attention.”

She stared at him.

He ended it with, “’Night, babe,” and without her reply, he walked away.

He was backing out of her driveway, arm hooked behind Frankie’ seat, when she asked, “What was that about?”

“Your girl doesn’t wanna get laid,” he told her. “She wants to stop bein’ lonely. She’s got the tools to do that but she’s not usin’ ’em. I pointed that out to her.”

Frankie was silent as Ben put his truck into drive and headed them home.

Ben thought it was done until he stopped at a light and Frankie spoke.

“Have I told you you’re awesome today?”

He looked at her and grinned, replying, “Nope.”

His grin died when he saw her face lit by street and dashboard lights and he heard the tone of her words, saying, “You’re awesome, Benny Bianchi.”

At that, Ben lifted a hand, curled it around her neck, and pulled her to him, dropping his head and taking her mouth.

The car behind them had to honk to get them to break it off.

And that was all good, since where they were going, he could fully show his appreciation, and to be able to do that thoroughly was not in the time he had at a red light.