Lost Justice (Croft Family Mob Series Book 2) Read online

  He couldn’t hold back any longer.

  Greyson gave in.

  The heat overtook him. Closing his eyes, he let the orgasm pull him under. He let his wife’s mouth drain him of everything—including the stress.

  When he resurfaced, she was tucking him into his boxers and smiling like a cat who swallowed a canary.

  “We should have had sex. What if that was one of our children?” he muttered, trying to be funny.

  She laughed. “Well, I can never do it again if that’s what you want,” she offered.

  He opened his molten eyes. “Bite your tongue, kitten. I better get a lot more of that.”

  She zipped him up.

  It was clear the stress had lessened on his shoulders. That had been her plan.

  “I think we can work something out,” she said, hugging him. “I’m sorry I made you feel disrespected,” she stated. “That wasn’t my intent.”

  He left kisses across her face. “That more than made up for it. I think every time you make me angry, it should end just like this.”

  Yeah, his wife on her knees was a perfect solution to every argument. Greyson could definitely get behind that.

  Every.

  Damn.

  Day.

  “Just promise that you and Dimitri will be safe tomorrow when you go out.”

  “I have to stop at a couple strip clubs too. How upset will you be when I tell you that you’re not going to them?”

  She laughed.

  “I’m being serious.”

  “I tell you what. You let me go to the warehouse, and I’ll bow out of the tittie bars.”

  “You don’t want to go and get all sexed up with me?” he teased.

  “You can come home and I’ll give you one hell of a lap dance to make up for it.”

  He stared at her.

  “That’s a mean picture to put in my head if you’re not going to follow through, Emma.”

  She winked at him.

  “I was being serious.”

  That was all she had to say.

  “I’m in.”

  Somehow, she didn’t doubt that.

  * * * G r e y s o n C r o f t * * *

  Warehouse

  It didn’t take Natasha and Chris long to get inside. Chris knocked the man out, and she picked the lock with the small kit she had in her back pocket.

  Once they were in, they locked the doors so no one could sneak in on them.

  “How many more?” he whispered.

  She shook her head. “Katerina and Dimitri said three. So, there is just this last one. Do you want me to handle him, or do you want him?” she asked.

  “I’ll take him out. You get inside the office and get that painting,” he whispered.

  Chris knew how dangerous this would be, since he was taking on the only man moving around in the dark. He wasn’t familiar with the place, and one mistake…

  He couldn’t think about it.

  Quietly, he ducked around a corner to go cut the other man off. He was going to do the job so she could do hers.

  When he was gone, Natasha moved up the stairs, barely making a single noise.

  She was silent.

  She was trained.

  That painting was hers.

  As she picked the lock to the door, she noticed she was in the clear. Heading in, she scoped out the room. The painting sat on the wall. This was going to be cake, and she loved the thrill of the chase.

  The floor behind her creaked.

  “That was fast, Captain.”

  When he didn’t speak, she turned, only to find a gun pointed in her face.

  Natasha swallowed.

  She’d been complacent, trusting her partner to have her back, but the intel had been wrong.

  God!

  It had been so very wrong.

  Now she was going to pay for that.

  So, this was how she was going to die, and before she got to take the sexy captain for a spin.

  Well, shit.

  This sucked.

  “You’re breaking and entering, Miss Gideon.” He shoved her against the wall and placed the nose of the gun beneath her jaw.

  “Today, you die.”

  His finger went to the trigger, and she closed her eyes.

  Natasha knew this was it.

  She only prayed that Chris escaped.

  Chris dispatched guard number three without breaking a sweat. Knocking him out was easy. All he had to do was sneak up behind him and hit him on the back of the head with the butt of his gun.

  It was effective.

  He made a mental note to clean his sidearm when he got home. He was pretty sure he left some scalp and blood on it.

  When in Rome, think like a criminal.

  Still, old habits die hard. Chris took a few extra minutes to drag the man’s body out of the building. If they were going to light it up, he couldn’t be inside.

  While he’d steal, commit arson, and break the law, he wasn’t a murderer.

  No.

  He wouldn’t go there.

  Life was precious to him, and the idea of killing someone didn’t sit well with him.

  It was abhorrent to him.

  Chris had his limits, and that was number one with a bullet. So, the family would just have to deal with it.

  He wouldn’t kill on his watch.

  Heading back up the stairs, he heard talking, and something was wrong. Natasha was talking to him—only he wasn’t in the room.

  His gut screamed in alarm.

  When Chris made it to the open door, he saw Natasha against the wall, a Glock beneath her chin, and a man ready to steal her life.

  It was going bad.

  They had a fourth guard in the building, and he was going to kill Natasha.

  Yeah, no.

  Not on his watch.

  Chris did the only thing he could. Moving toward the man, he grabbed him by the head and twisted with all his might.

  There was the cracking of bones, the popping of vertebra, and the end of the man’s life.

  Chris broke his neck.

  He fell to the ground.

  Well, so much for not crossing that last line. He just tripped over it and landed on the dark side of the law.

  “Christopher.”

  “Get the painting and anything else we need. There were four men, and Dimitri’s information was wrong. I don’t want to play with odds we don’t know.”

  She wanted to kiss him, thank him, and tell Chris how she loved him for what he did, but he wasn’t happy.

  Natasha was smart enough to see his anger through the controlled words.

  So, she listened to him.

  She did her thing, pulling the painting from the wall to reveal Tony Mays’s safe behind it.

  Pay dirt.

  There was no way she was walking away from that. Natasha was hell on a safe. She could crack them with the best of them. She had excellent hearing, and she wanted what was inside.

  She got to work.

  Chris listened to the tumblers and he knew he should be more worked up about what he’d just done. He’d killed someone without even trying to neutralize the situation a better way.

  He was no better than Dimitri, and he knew it.

  Then he stared at Natasha.

  She was the cause.

  He’d done it to save her. Had he not, her brains would be all over the ceiling and wall.

  It turned his stomach.

  Yeah, he could live with that. There was no way her life coming to an end was worth his moral code.

  Yeah, he was just like Dimitri, and he was fine with that.

  “I’m in,” she said, pulling open the safe.

  Inside, there were blue prints, Cargo lists, and a gorgeous necklace made of rubies.

  “I can’t leave this behind,” she stated, dropping all of it into a messenger bag.

  When she turned, Chris was watching her.

  “Are you mad at me?” she asked.

  “No, why?” he asked.

&n
bsp; She moved toward him, jumped up, and kissed him with all she had. Chris actually was caught off guard and stumbled backward under her weight.

  The mating of mouths was like lava, melting him from the inside out. He was pretty sure he’d never been kissed like that by anyone before her.

  Holy shit!

  It made him rock hard.

  When she set his mouth free, she stared into baby blue eyes. “How about now?”

  “Uh, no.”

  She laughed. “Let’s blow this place. Literally. I want to go home—with you.”

  Chris couldn’t breathe.

  Could she mean?

  Did that mean?

  He stared at her.

  “Are you coming?” she asked, holding out her hand for him to take.

  He did.

  They set the charges and blew that place.

  To hell and back.

  * * * G r e y s o n C r o f t * * *

  It was tense back at the house.

  That was until Greyson came into the room, carrying Emma over his shoulder. Her laughter seemed to lift the gloom and worry.

  They weren’t at each other’s throats.

  No one wanted to see mom and dad fight.

  Seeing that they were okay, they could relax too.

  “Have they checked in?” Greyson asked, putting his wife back onto her feet.

  “Yeah, they are about to get here,” Dimitri stated. “Are you both better?” he asked.

  “She’s not going to the strip clubs, but she will be joining me at the warehouse. All three of us can go.”

  He was good with that.

  If Emma went, he could spend the majority of his time focusing on everything around them, and not the actual contents of the warehouse. After Chris and Emma had been shot at, Dimitri didn’t want to let down his guard.

  At all.

  “Are you okay with that?” Greyson asked.

  “Yeah, I am.”

  “Great.”

  The gate alarm went off, and they waited for Chris and Natasha to arrive.

  When they came in, carrying their loot, everyone relaxed again.

  “How did it go?” Emma asked. She was trying not to mother them to death, but she was so glad they were back behind the safety of the gate.

  Natasha simply smiled.

  Well, Chris wasn’t going to let it go. He was pissed that they had bad intel. It had nearly cost Natasha her life.

  That was unacceptable to him.

  “It could have been better.”

  “What happened?” Greyson asked.

  “Well, to start off, there were four, not three guards on duty,” Chris stated.

  Dimitri shrugged.

  Well, that pissed Chris off.

  “Well, it’s been a while. Obviously, he upped his security when we stopped working for him.”

  “Natasha nearly died because of the bogus intel.”

  That stopped Dimitri from being so blasé about the entire thing.

  It stopped it fast.

  “Wait! What do you mean?”

  “Because we didn’t know there was a fourth man, she ended up with a gun pressed to her throat. He was going to kill her.”

  She took Chris’s hand in hers. “He saved me. It’s over, and I’m perfectly fine.”

  Dimitri looked a little green around the gills.

  “I had to kill him.”

  Emma crossed to him and hugged him. “I’m so sorry you had to cross that line.”

  Well, at least she got it.

  At least Emma realized how damn hard this was for him. Yes, he saved Natasha, but he’d taken a life in cold blood, and he’d sworn…

  Then he looked at Greyson.

  He recalled the talk they had.

  Option one?

  Option two?

  He’d taken the last one and now he needed to suck it up, deal with it, and stop blaming Dimitri. Any of them could be killed at any time.

  This was the nature of the beast.

  “I guess this proves one thing,” he said.

  Dimitri stared at him. He was expecting the worst.

  “What?”

  “That I’m good enough to date your sister.”

  He released the breath he was holding. What could he say to that?

  He absolutely was.

  “You have my blessing. You saved her life, so I offer you my thanks, Captain.”

  He simply shrugged.

  “She was my partner. I had her back. She would have done the same.”

  Natasha went up on her toes and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “I would have in a heartbeat.”

  That was all he needed to hear.

  Option two wasn’t so bad after all.

  “We got everything and then some things,” he said, changing the subject.

  Natasha didn’t miss how he was covering for her. She’d made a mistake, and it could have cost Natasha her life.

  Chris didn’t tell Dimitri that she’d let her guard down. If he did…yeah, he wouldn’t be happy.

  She owed him.

  And a Gideon always paid their debts.

  “Let’s see it,” Emma stated.

  Natasha unrolled the painting and placed it on the coffee table. It was one Emma had seen before.

  “That was stolen from a local museum. I remember seeing it on the news,” she said, staring down at it. “It’s hideous.”

  They all agreed.

  “Why did he want this?” Emma asked.

  “Because he couldn’t have it. Most men, who can’t get what they want, tend to find a way to claim what isn’t theirs,” stated Dimitri.

  Tony Mays was that kind of man.

  “When he looked at that, he probably thought he was coming up in the world.”

  “Yes, it is his ambition personified in an object.”

  Greyson slipped on a pair of gloves. With a Sharpie, he left the message.

  ‘You’re dead, Tony. You crossed the line. Wait for it. We are coming for you.

  ~Karma.’

  He capped the marker and started laughing like a maniac. He hoped the man shit himself when he saw it.

  That would be poetic justice.

  “Well, that says it all,” Chris stated. “He’s going to be paranoid and looking over his shoulder for a very long time. Maybe he’ll leave Vegas.”

  Yeah, Greyson was aware, and he could only hope that was the case.

  He was done retaliating.

  Now it was going to be about scaring the man into wondering when it was coming.

  “What else did you find?” Emma asked. “I think I know why you like this, Nat. It’s fun.”

  Her husband looked at her.

  “Well, it is.”

  Natasha laughed as she pulled a necklace out of the bag to show Emma what else she’d absconded.

  Emma couldn’t help herself.

  She giggled.

  “It’s not happening, Emma,” Greyson said. “You can’t be seen out in public with that necklace.”

  She sighed. “You are no fun, Greyson Croft. A girl can’t even daydream.”

  He didn’t disagree.

  Oh, he was fun, but not when it came to plastering a bull’s-eye on his wife.

  Yeah, no.

  “What are we going to do with it?” Chris asked. He fully expected Dimitri to claim it.

  The man did.

  “Curtis, find out who it belongs to, and mail it to them. If it’s a museum piece, get it back to them,” Dimitri stated.

  Chris was surprised.

  Greyson had been right.

  Beneath it all, Dimitri wasn’t the man he wanted the world to think he was. In fact, he was the opposite.

  He was a decent human being.

  “That was very Robin Hood of you,” Chris stated.

  “Are you surprised?” he asked, his voice tinged with Russian.

  “Yes.”

  Dimitri grinned. “Thank you for not lying. That means more than your self-doubt in me.”

  Greyson
got them back on track. “What else do you have in that bag of tricks, Natasha?”

  She tossed Curtis the gorgeous necklace and internally wished it was hers. Still, she knew the rules, and Dimitri didn’t let them keep things that weren’t theirs.

  He was strict like that.

  “There are blue prints.”

  Nat put them on the table.

  Greyson, since he was wearing the gloves, unrolled them. He stared down at them and didn’t speak. He’d seen them before. He was sure of it.

  But where.

  He wracked his brain.

  Then it hit him.

  “Wait.”

  “What?” Dimitri stated.

  “These look familiar.”

  Dante moved toward them to check them out. The second he saw them, he knew what his brother was talking about.

  “They should. Those are the plans for your warehouse. I showed you these about a month ago.”

  “Which one?” Greyson asked, needing his memory refreshed. While he and Emma headed the empire, he didn’t deal with things like this.

  Honestly, Dante showed him a lot of shit.

  Mostly, he approved it just to get it over with. The business wasn’t his thing. He simply played bad guy.

  He rattled off the address.

  Emma knew why it seemed familiar. “That’s the address tied to that keycard.”

  Well, this was another coincidence.

  And it wasn’t a good one.

  “So we have a man who disappeared working for Mays, a set of blue prints belonging to my building, and no clue what ties them all together,” Greyson stated.

  Emma started laughing.

  “What is so funny?” he asked.

  “I love a mystery.”

  Chris shook his head. “I’m going to go shower. I dealt with her crazy on the force. She’s your issue now.”

  He started walking away.

  “Good job, Captain,” Dimitri stated.

  Chris turned at the doorway. “Thank you.”

  When he was gone, Emma finally spoke, “Okay, Natasha. How bad was it? He’s rattled. I can tell just by looking at him.”

  “The fourth guard had me at gunpoint. Chris snapped his neck or my brains would have been on the wall. I think he’s worked up.”

  Emma went to leave.

  “No,” stated Dimitri.