The Promise (The 'Burg #5)(114)

Now, Frankie was opening a white box that contained a dozen donuts they would hoover through in the next two days, wishing they had more.

She was also talking.

“I know. Crazy. Murder. Killed in his own house. Shot right in the head.”

Ben did not have a good feeling about this, mostly because he never had a good feeling about murder.

He also didn’t have a good feeling about this because Frankie just told him an employee at her company had been murdered, and Frankie was a magnet for drama. It wasn’t her that did anything, unless she was crazily following some goons who’d kidnapped three people a state away.

That didn’t mean she didn’t attract more than her fair share just by breathing.

People went their whole lives without, say, their boyfriends getting whacked. Or themselves getting shot. Or working at a place where someone took a bullet to the brain.

Frankie had all three.

And then some.

“The thing is,” Frankie went on, “I’ve got a weird feeling.”

This did not make him feel any better.

“A weird feelin’ about what?” he asked as she plucked a powdered sugar, chocolate-cream-filled donut out of the box and turned to him.

“Dr. Gartner getting murdered.”

“Babe, he was murdered. That’d give anyone a weird feeling.”

She took a bite, chewed, and swallowed, and he reached for a glazed as she continued.

“He was lead on a big product we’re launching. It doesn’t go live for a while. They’re designing packaging, brochures, leaflets. Organizing presales talk ups through the reps. Shit like that. But his boss, the big cheese of research and development, gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

And Ben again did not feel better.

“How does he give you the heebie-jeebies?” he asked, taking his own bite.

She moved to the coffeepot and started filling the cups they’d left there when they went to get donuts, doing this one-handed, the other hand holding her donut in the air, saying, “He’s a dick.”

Ben’s body got tight again.

“A dick, how?”

She looked to him. “How’s a dick a dick? He’s just a dick.”

“He a dick to you?”

“Not directly. He just spreads his dick-ness wide.”

“And so he’s a dick…” Benny trailed off on a prompt.

“I don’t know,” she said, grabbing a mug and bringing it across to him where he stood at the bar that delineated the kitchen from the dining area. She set it on the counter by him and went back to get her own. “The whole thing just gives me a weird feeling. He’s all over this product, as he would be. Pharmaceutical companies dump a shitload into development, so they like the happy place of rolling it out and finally making money on it. I just get…” She shook her head, lifted her cup, took a sip, dropped it, and caught his eyes. “A weird feeling.”

“You have anything to do with development and this dick guy?”

“Not really.”

“Don’t have anything to do with development or this dick guy,” Ben ordered.

Her eyes narrowed and she stated, “I have to work with him, Ben.”

“Right. I get that. But stay away from this. Stay away from talk about this man who was murdered. Put your head down. Do your job. Let whatever happened blow over.”

Her eyes stayed narrowed as she replied, “I kinda was intending to do that already.”

“Take the ‘kinda’ outta that and we’re good.”

“Benny!” she snapped.

“Baby, you and murder and dicks…not a good combination. It doesn’t have anything to do with you. Let it play out not havin’ anything to do with you.”

“It can’t have anything to do with me, Ben. There’re rumors it was a professional hit. Obviously, the guy got into someone for money or pissed someone off he shouldn’t have. I mean, it’s shocking but shit happens. It has nothing to do with me.”

“Keep it that way.”

At that, her brows shot up. “I’m hardly gonna start my own amateur investigation.”

“Good news.”

“Benny!” she snapped, louder this time.

“Cara, this guy got murdered and he worked for your company. My brother was murdered. My woman was shot. You live in Brownsburg. I live in Chicago. Not easy for me to keep an eye on you the way a man should keep an eye on his woman, and I don’t like that normally. When professional hits are carried out on your coworkers, I really don’t like that. Cut me some slack here, yeah?”

She glared at him as she announced, “And this is yet another time you’ve made protectiveness annoying.”

He grinned, lunged, caught her around the back of her neck, and pulled her to him so she slammed into his body.

Luckily, she’d put down her mug.

Also luckily, she tipped her head back to say something smart so he had his target and he aimed.

His tongue sweep encountered donut, coffee, and Frankie. Getting that, even though he’d f**ked her before donuts and coffee, he wanted her again.

On her knees.

First, f**king her face.

After that, taking her pu**y.

So he ordered, “Finish your donut. In the mood to f**k you again.”