Six weeks ago.

“What did you find?” I ask Cassidy as I shuffle through paperwork on my desk.

“Absolutely nothing,” she deadpans.

I stop and give her my attention. “You sure?”

She folds her arms across her body, widening her stance. “You asked me to follow her and I did. You asked me to dig and I dug. When I tell you I found nothing, boss, it means I found nothing.”

I frown and look around the room, not wanting to look Cassidy in the eye, the guilt over having Lindsey followed is already eating away at me. I should have given her the benefit of the doubt the day she saw Baccarelli in the diner. There was just something gnawing at my brain, and a knot in my gut, telling me I was missing something. The woman can be as cold as ice, living in her head even if she’s standing right beside you. There are secrets behind those eyes and I feared they weren’t the kind I’d look forward to finding out.

But I knew all I could. Cassidy is the best at digging through dirty laundry. If she says she found nothing, then there’s nothing to tell. Now I just had to have faith in the woman I’d fallen for.

“No she hasn’t, thankfully. I still have no clue what that meeting meant and if she realizes who he is, but we’re not taking it further. Not until we have to. If the media finds out Lorenzo Baccarelli is alive and well, we could have a war on our hands we’re not prepared for. We don’t know what he wants and right now, he’s not causing us trouble, so this stays within the walls of this room, because outside of here, we don’t know who we can trust. We all good with that?”

“Yeah,” mumbles from all three of them.

I sit up straighter, the positive part of this mess brightening my mood a little. “Now, I’m gonna go out on a limb here and take a not so wild guess and say Adriana Marino has run off with her lover boy and together they’re hiding from pretty much everyone. She made bail but now that she’s run, this changes things.”

Roamyn chimes in from the other side of the desk where he sits in the guest chair. “What do you want us to do about it?” he asks, his tone low, face serious.

“Right now, we just keep our eyes peeled and ears open. I wanted you all to know what’s going on now we got word of Adriana. This is, in a way, a good thing for Lindsey and Alison. With Lucio and Giuseppe sitting in Rikers and Adriana supposedly missing, Giuseppe Marino is distracted, so instead of plotting his revenge on our girls, he’s probably trying to find out where his daughter is and how the fuck he’s gonna get him and his son out of years of imprisonment.”

Cassidy coughs and we all turn to face her. “I saw the photos of those two. If she’s with him, I’m sure she’s fine. I saw the way they looked at each other. They’re in love.” She fiddles with her necklace as she speaks, her eyes downcast to the ground, her stare vacant, her mind miles away.

Elias sighs and shakes his head, obviously aware of Cassidy’s odd reaction. “Cass has hit the mark with that one. Baccarelli is whipped over Marino pussy. He’s not gonna let anything happen to the girl.”

“All right. Well that’s all I needed, so let’s get out of here.” I grab my phone off the desk as I stand up and click the side to light up the screen.  “I was supposed to be home an hour ago. Lindsey’s cooking us dinner.” I push the chair in and we all make our way out.

“Oh, that’s sweet. How very domestic of her,” Cassidy chimes, her tone lighter than a moment ago.

“I don’t know if I’d call it sweet. If I’m not in tomorrow, it’s because I’ve contracted food poisoning and probably died,” I mutter, my stomach already churning at the idea of having to endure Lindsey’s cooking.

“Oh, come on, don’t be an asshole. It can’t be that bad.” Roamyn chuckles and my lips curl upward as I remember Lindsey’s last attempt at making pancakes for Charlotte for breakfast.

“She’s blown up three microwaves.”

Elias looks at me, eyebrows raised, his expression stunned. “Seriously? Remind me never to eat her food.”

Holding the door open, Cassidy, Roamyn, and Eli pass through and I follow behind them as we make our way to the precinct’s exit, passing the other officers and patrons on the way. Our unit is small and the offices private, located at the back of the building.

“If my toast is only a little burnt in the morning, I’m cheering,” I reply, my tone light as I appreciate at least a few seconds of the day where everything isn’t so full-on and chaotic.

Roamyn lets out a booming laugh. “That bad, huh?”

I think of Lindsey in my kitchen, long hair tied up, her fussing over what ingredient goes in the pot next. Charlotte sitting on one of the stools at the counter telling her she’s cutting the onion wrong and she just put in too much sauce. A smile plays at my lips and I can’t help but fucking grin as my heart beats strongly for the love of the two amazing girls I’ve got in my life.

“Nah, I fucking love it.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Mason

A week of looking over our shoulders passes. Two weeks of keeping my girls close and eyes open, pass. After the third week of normalcy with no strange feelings of being followed and no word on the Marino front, I start to relax and let a small part of the dread consuming me float to the back of my mind.

Leaning back into the uncomfortable hardness of the park bench, a feeling resonates in my chest I haven’t allowed myself to dwell on, even though I’ve been feeling it for a few weeks. I can’t explain it because it isn’t happiness. It’s so much more than something that simple. When I think about Lindsey and Charlotte, I feel a completeness I’ve never experienced before. It glues every crack in my heart back together, securing it with loyalty and an unspoken bond that I’ll happily lay my life on the line to save theirs.

I can hear their laughs from the playground, the sounds so different from everyone else’s because they are mine. My woman, my daughter. My family. Sitting alone on the seat, I watch the relationship between Lindsey and Charlotte grow. A weight shifts inside me as Lindsey gazes my way with a look in her eyes that I never want to die. Laughing with my daughter in the park, smiling at me like I’m the only man she sees, she steals my heart and doesn’t even know it. And as I watch the adoration for Lindsey pour out from Charlotte as they have races down the slippery slide, I know she’s worked her way into Charlotte’s heart too. She’s becoming a mother to my child, one I’m sure Victoria would be proud to have fulfill the role that was unfairly taken from her.

We still have so much to learn about each other, but every day we shared more, we learned more, and that is enough.

Children’s voices fill the park, their doting parents smiling and encouraging them. Caring nannies push around prams and chase after the runaway toddlers. The sun beams off the inviting play equipment, its colors brightening the day. The trees blow in the wind and the chilly March air sends a shiver through me that I feel right down to my bones.

My pulse quickens each time Charlotte reaches higher in the air from her spot on the swing. She giggles like crazy because Lindsey stands beside her, hand flat on her chest, eyes filled with worry. I chuckle. She may just be more over protective than I am..

A chill of a different kind washes over me. Dread licks at the edges of my pounding heart when I notice Lindsey stiffen, deadly still. Her face washes of any color and the look in her eyes kills a piece of me I’ll never get back.

I’ve seen the look, many times. It’s the profound moment between life and death when the realization hits that this is it, the end is all but a mere second away.