Safe and Assigned to Ecstasy [The Heroes of Silver Island 5] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Page 2

  Cameron Stone would recover, the shipment of the drug the DEA officials had been after had been seized, and Kesor, Malis, and Alec were now in custody. All in all, most agents would chalk up today’s events to one very successful operation. Adam wasn’t most agents. He couldn’t be when he knew that nothing would’ve happened today if Alec hadn’t been tortured to the point of blocking out everything of his life prior to becoming second-in-command of the new cartel.

  Minutes that felt like hours passed. Adam didn’t break the silence. He could wait out a dead man. When he thought about it that way, he supposed that was exactly what he was doing now. Alec McIntyre was currently dead, taken over completely by Alec Veansa.

  “What happens now?” Alec finally asked, his voice devoid of inflection.

  Adam waited for the man’s gaze to lift to his before he answered. “You tell us everything you know about Boran Roumduol, his whereabouts, the names of the other men he has working for him, and any future plans he may have.”

  “And, in return, we’ll help you remember the man you really are,” Graham added, his tone full of compassion and understanding.

  Alec’s lips unfolded in a malicious grin as he relaxed back in his chair. “And how do you know I’m not faking? How do you know I didn’t purposely bury that guy”—he pointed at a photo of McIntyre on the desk—“because I like the guy I am now better?”

  “We don’t.” But if it was a charade, which Adam highly doubted, Alec couldn’t keep it up forever and would be stupid to even try. Alec, whether going by the last name of McIntyre or Veansa, had been a lot of things, but stupid had never been one of them. “The guy you are now has two options. You can continue your life as Alec Veansa, a life I can tell you will be spent behind bars, or you can help us and let us help you.”

  One phone call to the Waterston branch had been all Adam had needed to make to get the ball rolling for a team of the bureau’s best doctors in the field to help Alec regain his memories.

  And one more call would’ve gotten you more personalized treatment from the woman you want.

  Fuck! Now was not the time for Jennifer Moss to invade his thoughts. Yes, since he’d last seen her, she’d graduated from Waterston University with a master’s degree in psychology, but she had pursued employment with the bureau. And, yes, Adam wanted her. Which was double fuck time because, damn it, he was too old for her and yet he couldn’t keep from covertly checking up on her, thinking about her, and friggin’ fantasizing about her.

  “Let’s say I go for option number two. Then what?” Alec wanted to know. “I’ll be exchanging that life behind bars for one in a padded room until I get these memories back you’re saying I’ve repressed?”

  “You’ll live with me.” Adam didn’t make decisions on a whim, but damn if that one hadn’t been on impulse. He saw Graham shift on the edge of the desk and shoot him a quizzical look over his shoulder.

  Yeah, Adam would have to pull some strings and call in a slew of the favors he’d stockpiled over the years to make that happen, but he could do it. He would do it. Alec, as with any of the other men and women on his team, was his responsibility and, though he knew damn well it wasn’t good to mix associations, the man was also his friend.

  Alec glared at him, the man’s expression blank and eyes unreadable. More of those minutes that felt like hours passed before he finally said, “I’ll tell you this much. Roumduol isn’t stateside. Once he gets wind of me and my men being taken into custody and the shipment being confiscated, he’ll become a ghost until he regroups.”

  But the man would regroup. Adam had no doubts about that. And when the fucker did, with Alec’s help, he was going to see that he and his newly reformed cartel would go down once and for all.

  Chapter One

  Silver Island – Present Day

  She should’ve been back home in her apartment in Waterston going over client files and preparing for tomorrow’s appointments. Instead, Jennifer Moss had cleared her schedule for the next few weeks and jumped ship. Or rather, she had boarded a ship after a two-hour drive in a rental car and was now strolling down the sidewalk on the main drag of Silver Island, her mind more at peace than it had been in years.

  “It’s happening already, isn’t it?”

  Jennifer slid a sideways look at her best friend, Lexie Stratus. “What’s happening already?”

  “You’re feeling better. You’re not stressing or dwelling on the past. I told you a vacation was just what the doctor ordered.”

  Jennifer couldn’t argue and figured, being a doctor herself, especially when her specialty was in psychology, she should’ve been the one to prescribe the getaway for both of them a long time ago. Although, she had been surprised when Lexie had suggested Silver Island as their vacation spot. The once uninhabited chunk of land in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Silver Springs, Mississippi, had been purchased, developed, and was now home and tourist attraction for those who lived alternative lifestyles and especially those who preferred ménage relationships.

  Jennifer couldn’t say the island would’ve been her first choice, but the instant she’d stepped off the excursion boat that had brought them from the mainland, she had known she’d made the right decision when she’d agreed to come. The beauty of the island was simply breathtaking, the people friendly, and the sense of being in sheer paradise utterly overwhelming.

  “You’re right. I needed this.”

  And so did you, my friend.

  She wasn’t the only one who had been stressed and dwelling on a past that had occurred nearly three years ago. The horrors Lexie had experienced had been far worse than anything Jennifer had ever gone through. Medical attention had healed Lexie’s wounds on the outside. Counseling and therapy had helped mend some of the internal scars, but the damage that had been done when she’d been abducted by the leader of a sex trafficking ring and sold off to the highest bidder before being rescued had left marks on her soul that may never go away.

  “I need that.”

  Lexie had stopped a few feet from a shop called Pleasured Minds. Jennifer read the store name stenciled among an array of stars, half-moons, and open books on the glass of the propped-open door.

  “You need a book?” As ways to pass the time went, reading was one of Jennifer’s favorites. If nothing else, a good book always provided means of a temporary escape from reality. She’d been trying to pass on the passion to Lexie for years. Odd that her friend would pick now to finally listen.

  Lexie shook her head hard enough to send her blonde ponytail swinging. “A cheeseburger.”

  Jennifer laughed and turned a full circle on the sidewalk as she scanned the array of businesses lining the street on both sides. “Where do you see a cheeseburger? And we just ate right before we left the mainland. How can you possibly be hungry again already?”

  They had arrived on the last ferry to the island for the day barely an hour before sunset. After checking into their room at the island’s resort and stashing their belongings inside, they had decided to venture out for a little sightseeing before calling it a night.

  “I don’t see a cheeseburger. I smell it.”

  Now that Lexie had mentioned it, Jennifer did, too, and couldn’t believe it when her belly gave a low growl at the whiff of charbroiled beef.

  Lexie snagged Jennifer’s wrist and pulled her toward the door of the bookstore. “It’s coming from in here.”

  “It must be one hell of a scratch and sniff cookbook,” Jennifer muttered as she stepped over the threshold.

  The smell was stronger inside the shop, though it mingled with the scent of the burning incense sticks perched in silver trays surrounded by colorful gemstones on a small round table to the right of the door. The shop was long and narrow with more small tables scattered about the front, each holding their share of containers loaded with rough gems, jars of incense sticks and cones, and bottles of oils. Beyond them were bookshelves that spanned the length of the store and stretched from wall to wall.

 
; “I do have cookbooks, though I’m afraid none of them are scratch and sniff.” To Jennifer’s left, a woman she guessed to be in her late fifties or early sixties rounded a counter supporting an antique cash register, more candles and incenses, and a display of herbs in clear bags. “I’m Elen.”

  “Jennifer.” She extended a hand, surprised by the sure grip she got from Elen in return. “And that’s my friend, Lexie.”

  “Elen, darling.” Lexie retraced the steps she’d taken, turned, and draped an arm around Elen’s slender shoulders. “Where is it? You know what I’m talking about.”

  Elen’s wrinkled lips stretched into an ear to ear grin. The pentacle-shaped ring on the finger the woman lifted to point across the shop caught Jennifer’s attention. Not that she hadn’t already been fascinated by the rest of the woman’s appearance. Matching large silver pentacle earrings dangled amid long, wavy locks of graying black hair that framed an aging, oval face with dark-brown eyes. She wore a blouse as bright yellow as the sun that hung long and free past the waistband of a flowing, tan, ankle length skirt. On her feet were a pair of truly adorable strappy sandals.

  “See that door over there?”

  “Aha!” It was all Elen had to say to have Lexie making a beeline straight for it.

  Jennifer smacked a hand over her face, watching Lexie through her parted fingers as she disappeared through another propped open door, this one with the words Karma Café stenciled into the glass, that adjoined the bookstore with what was apparently the creation of the cheeseburger Lexie sought.

  “Please excuse her.” Given that Elen hadn’t yet stopped smiling, Jennifer could see Lexie was already forgiven. “She’s a bottomless pit and a cheeseburger connoisseur.”

  “My daughter runs the café. Arianrhod is a true goddess in the kitchen. Your friend won’t be disappointed.”

  Now thoroughly intrigued, Jennifer thanked Elen for her time and direction and entered the Karma Café. She found Lexie already seated in a booth along the wall inside the nearly empty dining room. A woman wearing clothes very similar to those Elen had been wearing was standing at the edge of the table.

  Jennifer waited for Lexie to finish placing their order before she asked the woman, “Are you the waitress or the kitchen goddess.”

  The woman certainly looked like a goddess with her mane of long, spiraling red locks, oval shaped face, and lively, starry blue eyes.

  “Tonight, I’m both and you must have been talking to my mother.”

  “She assured me Lexie wouldn’t be disappointed in your cheeseburger.”

  Arianrhod waggled her perfectly plucked brows. “Modesty aside, I can cook like a dream.”

  “I wish I could cook,” Lexie grumbled.

  “I’m willing to bet you know the basics.”

  “Basics, yes, but how to transform that into stupendous, no.”

  Arianrhod dragged her tongue between her bottom lip and teeth as she studied Lexie for a long moment. “I could teach you how to make that happen if you’re willing to learn. I’ve been short on help in the kitchen for months. If you’re interested in working while you’re on the island…”

  Lexie’s jaw dropped even as her eyes twinkled with excitement. “Are you offering me a job?”

  Arianrhod slowly backed away from the table. “Just giving you something to consider. I’ll put your orders on the grill and be back with your drinks in a few minutes.”

  Jennifer watched the woman turn and walk briskly, yet gracefully to the swinging door behind the counter. “That was weird.”

  “Tell me about it.” Lexie’s tone was full of awe. “It’s like she knew I’ve always wanted to be a chef.”

  Jennifer had been encouraging her friend to reapply to the community college in Waterston. Lexie had enrolled in culinary classes once but had been abducted by the sex trafficking ring before the term had started. Since then, she’d been bouncing from job to job with no true future goals in mind, trying to find her way again.

  “You should do it. Take her up on her offer.”

  “You really think so?”

  Jennifer shrugged. “Why not? I know you could use the extra money, and you would be doing something you’ve always wanted to do.”

  It could even turn out to be a new start for Lexie. Maybe getting out of Waterston for more than a few weeks, as in making a permanent move to the island, was what Lexie really needed. She could leave all the horrid memories behind, make a fresh start, and learn to be happy again for longer than just a little while. She’d certainly been smiling a lot more than she had in years since she’d stepped foot on the island. Maybe moving here would help make that last.

  “What are you going to do, though? We came to the island together. If I’m working here, you’re going to be alone half the time.”

  “I can hire you, too,” Arianrhod offered as she returned to the table with their sodas. “Or, you can talk to my sister Cerridwen over at Ménage a Drink. I believe she’s been looking for another bartender.”

  Okay, now that was beyond weird. Jennifer had paid her way through college working as a bartender. She’d quit once she’d gotten her master’s in psychology, landed a job at a great clinic, and began to make a respectable name for herself. But she missed it. She missed the interaction with customers, the bar ambiance, the freedom, and the fun. She missed it so much she’d even considered quitting the clinic and returning to the lifestyle.

  Puzzled and suddenly just a little on edge, she gave Arianrhod a narrow-eyed look. “How did you know I can tend bar?”

  Arianrhod lifted a slender shoulder. “You can just call it a hunch. Your burgers will ready in a few more minutes.”

  Lexie waited until Arianrhod had walked away again before she folded her arms on the table and leaned on them, lowering her voice to barely above a whisper. “Wasn’t Arianrhod a Greek goddess or something?”

  “Welsh,” Jennifer corrected her. She thought back to the mythology class she’d taken to fulfill one of her electives during her first two years of college. “I think she was the goddess of fertility, rebirth, and fate.”

  “Well, this Arianrhod”—Lexie lifted a hand to jab a thumb over her shoulder in the direction the woman had disappeared—“sure seems to be trying to rebirth us and change our fate.”

  Across the dining room at the counter, the only other patron stood, pulled his wallet from the back pocket of his tight-fitting jeans, and tucked a few bills beneath the edge of his plate. Jennifer took him in with a glance…tall, muscular, but not overly so, tousled dark hair, and, when he turned to face their booth, she saw he had dark-green eyes nestled in a rather handsome face. Those dark-green eyes skipped over her and landed on Lexie.

  “I couldn’t help but overhear.” The man gestured pointedly at all the empty tables in the dining room. “Congratulations on your new job.” His gaze returned to Jennifer. “And good luck on yours at Ménage a Drink.”

  Lexie softly cleared her throat and shifted nervously. Jennifer hated the way a simple interaction with a man, any man, still made her friend so uncomfortable.

  Jennifer gave the man a smile. “Thank you.”

  His attention moved back to Lexie, even though Lexie hadn’t spared him so much as a cursory look. “I’ll wait a few days before I come back for a cheeseburger. You know, to give you time to get it perfected. Have a good evening, ladies.”

  And, with that, the man turned and made his way out of the café.

  “He was cute,” Jennifer commented. The man hadn’t been her type of cute, but then again, no man had seemed to be her type of cute since she’d met FBI Special Agent and team leader Adam Cooper when Lexie had been kidnapped. She’d known something had happened to her friend but hadn’t been able to get the local police to listen. After two failed attempts, she’d gone over the local PD’s head, managed to get a neighbor in her apartment building who just happened to be an FBI agent to believe her—and, okay, she’d actually kidnapped the agent at gunpoint in the parking garage, but desperate times ha
d called for desperate measures—and gotten the FBI on the case.

  “Really?” Lexie shifted again, this time leaning back in her seat as she pulled her soda closer. “I didn’t notice.”

  Of course she hadn’t because she hadn’t even looked at the guy. Jennifer was fairly certain her friend hadn’t really looked at any guy since she’d been rescued. Not that Jennifer could blame her. Lexie had been drugged, beaten, brutally raped, and put through hell. Would she ever recover enough to have a happy, healthy relationship with a man?

  “Lex…” Jennifer’s chest tightened with sympathy. She wasn’t going to bring up the past, especially not when they’d been having such a good time, but… “You know—”

  “I don’t want to hear it, Jennifer,” Lexie abruptly cut her off.

  The door to the kitchen swung open, catching Jennifer’s attention. “I was just going to tell you that you know, if you learn to cook cheeseburgers as good as the ones you like to eat, you’re going to end up looking like a cow.” She tipped her chin toward Arianrhod as the woman approached the table, her hands laden with two plates overflowing with huge loaded cheeseburgers and a mountain of French fries. “Especially, if they’re that big.”

  Lexie took one look at them and moaned. “Finally, a cheeseburger I can sink my teeth into.”

  And, finally, the smile was back …at least for a little while.

  * * * *

  Alec’s gaze locked on her like a heat-seeking missile the instant she stepped beneath the thatch-covered triangular roof of Ménage a Drink. Auburn hair hung long and straight, the sides draped over slender shoulders and framing an angelic face peppered with freckles, high cheekbones, and milk chocolate eyes. He watched those eyes scan the crowd, saw her take in the fact that the bar was standing room only tonight, and felt his dick stir when her bottom lip disappeared thoughtfully between her teeth as she turned to speak to her friend.