The Siren (The Chloe Chronicals Book 2) Read online

  I can't help but roll my eyes with this chick. I can't stand this line about how they sell children in order to stay alive. If I have a child (I know, it's funny for me to even think about it), I would kill someone. Children deserve to be kids and not treated like livestock. "This bitch is getting on my nerves," I grunt and rub my eyes.

  The three of us have been held up in this conference room for the past three days trying to figure out an angle of getting into the ring. There are boxes of take out from the restaurants around the bureau and I'm pretty sure all of us have gained five pounds this week.

  "Well, we need to find a way to get in... How do we do it?" Colin asks and looks pretty smug. I know he's happy that Grant is gone.

  Since Grant is off my force, he's been apart of the rapist case. This has gone from a few cases to over six in ten days. He's escalating and now he's mangling his victims. It's only a matter of time before he starts killing his victims. Of course, they being murdered is horrible... but part of me wonders if it would be easier on them to not have to live with the memories.

  I know, I'm a horrible person.

  "Special Agent Delacruz?" A voice asks through the door.

  Now, what have I done? "I haven't been out in the field so I know I didn't do anything," I mutter and walk over to the door to open it.

  A secretary for Captain stands in front of me and I know who she is. People say that she gets around and I'm beginning to wonder if it's true. Come on, if you were to see her... you would wonder too. Her shirts are always mis-buttoned to show more cleavage than necessary and her skirts get shorter and shorter.

  Don't get me wrong. I know it sounds as if I'm calling the kettle black. But I didn't go around and advertise all of what I have done. Or who've I done.

  "What?" I ask and instantly regret breathing so close to her. I can feel the coffee on my breath and it grosses me out. I have been here since five in the morning and it's after seven right now.

  She fluffs out her hair and moves to the side with a flare. Captain approaches and grunts at us. "All right, chuckle heads. Gather around."

  He takes a seat, the same seat that I am sitting in and I follow to sit on his left. "We got something new and I need to talk to Chloe before I can discuss it to all of you."

  "Me?" I squeak. Nervously, I gather all of my loose hair and tie it in a knot on the top of my head. "Uh, you guys go ahead," I murmur and bite my lip.

  Once they were all out, Captain placed a file in front of me. "Your brother isn't getting out soon without his cooperation... I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this but it's important that you know."

  BARRY DELACRUZ: WARRANT FOR SEX TRAFFICKING

  Grant

  Christine and I sit around the coffee table and talk about old times. A lot has changed since we stopped hanging out every day.

  "So, what's new with you?" I ask and take a pull off my beer.

  She laughs and puts another shot of Vodka in her drink. While she stirs she shrugs. "Same ol', same ol'. You know me."

  "I do know you, that is why I'm asking. You know, I never told anyone about that one time." My body shakes uncontrollably while I think about the one time in college where I lost control of myself.

  "It's for the best if we don't think about it. Some people might get upset if they know that we hooked up after you beat the shit out of my ex." Always so cavalier. I swear, nothing bothers this bitch.

  I shrug and take another pull off my beer.

  "I know I didn't mean anything to you. Grant, you've had a thing for Chlo forever. I know you were just pissed that she left and didn't say good-fucking-bye to you. She left me too. People keep forgetting that part."

  "Hey, there is no reason for you to say that," I state firmly and get off of my chair and kneel in front of her. Carefully, I put my hands on her thighs and squeeze gently.

  Before I know what's happening, she's got her lips on my mouth and I kiss her back. I have no idea how this happened. Christine sinks her fingers into my hair and I can feel her nails scratch against my scalp.

  Not long before I almost pushed her down on the couch and ate that pussy out, I began to remember that she is not Chloe. Oh, god. What the fuck have I done? I push her off of me and I can feel her nails as the scrape against my skin.

  "Stop!" I yell and jump to my feet.

  After all of this time, I have been begging for Chloe to be into our relationship and now I go and make out with her best friend? I'm worse than the ant that you just stepped on in your high heels. I'm not even worthy of being here.

  Christine puts a couple of fingers against her lips and doesn't even try to hide the horror of what she just did. "Fuck me, I'm so sorry. It is the Vodka. It has to be... My feelings for you sizzled out a long time ago..." She jumps out of her chair and Steve comes running into the room and barks uncontrollably.

  Great, now my girlfriend's dog is telling on me.

  "Get back here. We need to talk," I order and rub my hand down my face as I regain my place on the chair I am sitting in. She doesn't make an effort to come back and sit and I can't help but bare my teeth. "Christine!"

  She really just left.

  I stand in her room and take in the vacant look and feeling and I feel pangs of disappointment filter through me. How could she just leave without saying goodbye? I know that when we had sex... things became tense but we were friends before that.

  My best friend is gone and there is nothing I can do about it. The worst part about it is the fact that I didn't get the chance to tell her that I think I'm in love with her. When she had those dumb balls stuck in her pussy and she needed my help- it sealed the deal.

  I have been able to control my feelings for her throughout all of these years but once I felt her silky flesh- fuck! I became a pansy.

  The door to our- I mean, my- apartment opens and I hear heels click against the floor. "Grant?"

  "Yeah?" I call back. I know it's Christine since she said she wanted to stop by and say bye to me before I left for the academy. At least one of my friends cares about me enough to say it to my face.

  I watch her long brown hair as it flows behind her and I get caught up in the way it shimmers. She has always been beautiful, but she'll never be what Chloe is to me. As much as I hate to admit it, being Christine would be a hell of a lot easier than trying to court Chloe.

  Christine is the type to be in a relationship and she is the marrying kind. Chloe isn't and I know there is no changing it. Something had happened to make her this way and I don't know what it is.

  "Come here," I murmur and her eyes light up. Before I could blink, she wraps herself around me and squeezes.

  Her warmth penetrates my skin and I can't help but shiver from it. It's been a long time since someone had consoled me and my body is eating it up.

  I reached my head down and grabbed her chin to make her look up at me and then I kissed her. For some reason, I feel as if I'm starving for affection and I let everything go in that kiss. My tongue thrust its way into her mouth and I made love to her that way.

  Christine pulled herself closer to me and squeezed tighter to my thigh with hers. I felt the heat from her pussy against my thigh and I groaned.

  Caught up in it, I dipped my fingers down her body and I plunged two into her pussy.

  "Jesus, Grant... that feels so good," she murmured as my finger traced and circled her clit. "Feels so good... Oh, god!"

  "I bet it feels good, Christine... Are you going to come?" Before she could answer me, I pushed her down on the floor gently but with enough force to know that I'm in control. I yanked my fingers out of her pussy and brought the, to my mouth. I flicked my tongue over my fingers that were coated in her juices and closed my eyes. "Mmm, you taste very good."

  She went to sit up but I held her down with my body in order to let her know that I'm in charge. I didn't want to have to deal with her thinking that she is running this show. "No, you follow me or you get up right now and leave."

  Christine nodded and looked up at
me. "I just wanted to taste you."

  "Well, I don't want you to do that. What I want is a fuck. Can you do that?" I knew I am using her in order to get over what happened with Chloe, but I couldn't stop. My dick is begging to be released and there is no turning back what it wants. Part of me knows I should be feeling bad for using my friend, but the other part knows that she's probably using me too.

  "Yeah."

  I ripped her sweat pants off of her legs and reached into the pocket of my jeans to slip a condom on. Once my condom is secure, I push my pants down to my knees before sliding into her. She felt red hot as it seeped through my condom.

  I began to thrust in and out of her fast like I had a mission. And I did. I needed to get this done before the guilt kicked in.

  "Yeah, Grant... Mmm, baby, you feel so good." Heer nails bit into my shoulders and I felt the tightening in my legs.

  Sure having some crazy sex on the floor isn't the greatest idea, but I got leverage with my feet digging into the carpet. "Shush," I whispered and placed my hands on the floor next to her hips.

  "I always knew we would get together like this..."

  Before I could even begin to fathom what she said, I pulled out of her and flung myself away. I can't have that on my head.

  I knocked on Christine's door and waited for her to answer. When she didn't, I let myself into her room and found her in her closet. "Hey..."

  "Why does Chloe get everything? What does she have that I don't?'

  "Shh, don't think badly about yourself. In fact, her assistant has a major thing for you. We should double or something..." I had to put in a word for William and I might as well use this as the perfect opportunity.

  Chloe

  What if someone were to tell you that the roof is actually a floor and the floor is actually the ceiling? I mean that is like black actually being white and vice versa. It's totally unbelievable because everything you are taught to believe is wrong.

  My brother is wanted for questioning about sex trafficking? Who in the hell put those two things together? He maybe a lot of things but he's not involved in this shit. Something must be seriously wrong. Barry has been locked away for all of this time and now they want to throw more shit at him.

  I fight the urge to rip my boss' head off. I want it cleanly off.

  "What the fuck is this?" I growl and thrust the papers in his face. "Are you for real with this shit? If this is a joke..."

  He cuts me off and sticks his hand on top of the papers. "This is not a joke and I did some serious investigating in order to make sure this is true. And it is. He got the coke from the bath house. It's all connected."

  "No!" I yell and look at them to see where the mistake is. This has got to be a mistake. I read the whole report three times before I look at him. "The evidence seems legit... What... why didn't anyone tell me?"

  My boss looks pained and then shrugged. "You are a hot headed fed who just got promoted when this happened. You arrested your own brother and testified against him-" I wince with the harsh words that he's saying. It sounds so much worse. "- did you honestly think we were going to give you ammunition?"

  "Captain! This is my fucking brother. I have the right to know what he's involved in." I'm pleading with both myself and the captain. There must be some mistake and I'm going to find it. To believe that Barry would be involved in sex trafficking is appalling. He's not even a player or anything. Why the hell would he be interested or caught up in this? This is absolutely not fucking happening.

  The captain placed his hand on my shoulder and squeezed. "We don't like to think that there is bad in the world when we think about family..."

  Before I could say anything or have words come to my brain, I pushed his hand off of me and shot out of my chair. My happy ass made it out in the parking lot and in my car before I even realized what I am going to do. My car drove itself to the prison and I parked my car.

  I got out of my car and locked it while walking towards the visiting section. As easy as it could be to just say that I'm here for official business, I don't want to abuse my power.

  The insides smell like bleach and sterile hospitals... Which could only mean that they just cleaned and the prisoners are about to go on rec. Barry isn't in max pen but gen pop so he doesn't have to follow the strict rules. The guards tend to be nicer with gen pop rather than the max because they don't have to be on watch so much.

  I walk to the check-in area and greet my favorite guard. She's actually my friend, well sort of, but we've hung out a few times. Shelly Kostoni is hilarious drunk but she is a hard ass in here. She tried to get into the feds with me, but they thought she fit better in this controlled environment. If you ask me, it's because she's scary as shit. We're the same height and the same size but she's darker. Her family is pure Cuban.

  "Chlo! What are you doing here?" She asks me as she sets a pen in the book for me to sign in. "Are you on official business?"

  "Nah, I need to talk to Barry. Is he on rec or his cherry duty?" In order to get time shaved off of his sentence, he took on a job. When a prisoner enters into the prison jobs, their uniform gets changed to a cherry red in order to signify their place. On the back their shirt, is the name of the section they are working in.

  She shrugs and then types some things into the computer before looking behind her at the other guard. "It's my fifteen. Come on, I will take you to his cherry."

  We walk in silence while we walk through the main pop and then as we turn towards laundry, she stops. "Do you really think he's involved with this shit? Their talking about transferring him to the max side and extending his sentence."

  "Shell, come on. You know Barry isn't into this."

  She leads me into the laundry room and waves a key card under the sensor to get it to open. Once the door is pushed open, she knocks on the door. "Everyone out." The inmates (yes, inmates. Once they are convicted you don't have to call them detainees) just stop and stare at her. "If you don't move, you have to clean the main lobby after visiting. Move!"

  Everyone starts filing out like ants until Barry comes up next. "Chloe! What are you doing?"

  His eyes are darker around the eyeball and I can tell he's been fighting. When he goes to wrap an arm around my shoulders, he winces too. "What's up with your eyes? Have you been fucking fighting?"

  I hate having to be the righteous one but he needs out of here. Barry is a smart guy and I know he can do better than mess around with this shit. My brother and I have always been the ones that have been closet so I know that he can do much more.

  "Some of the guys... uh, they..." He looks at Shelly and she shrugs.

  "I'm going to be out here. Y'all got ten minutes. Make them count."

  "Is it true?" I demand and rest my back against the door. There is no way that I'm letting him escape with out telling me the truth. It just so happens, that he knows he can't lie to me.

  He shrugs and then kicks his slippered feet against the dirty floor. "Man, they need to clean more. It's messy in here."

  Yeah, I lost my cool. I pushed his shoulder and then folded my arms around my chest. "No, you don't get to do that shit. When my boss calls on me at work to discuss the fact there is evidence of my brother involved in sex trafficking, I get pissed."

  "Fine! I fucking bought drugs from them but I never partaken... I don't know how they got my information to give you." He wraps his arms around his chest and looks at me with new determination.

  I pushed myself away from the door and got into his face. "Quit lying. They must have gotten your number somehow. Barry, do you know how serious this is?"

  My hands went to yank my hair and then I remembered that I put it in a messy pony. Great. My brother is caught up in some shit and there is nothing that I can in order to save him. This is bad. Real bad.

  "Guard!" He yells and walks around me. "We're done!"

  "Barry, if you don't tell me what's going on, I can't help. Please let me help. Their going to put you away for years..."

  "No."

/>   As I drove away from the prison, I realized that there is no going back to work. I picked up my phone and dialed the captain.

  "Yes?" His smooth voice answered and I felt like crying.

  Emotions I didn't realize I had came to my eyes. "I'm going to work from home. See you tomorrow." I hang up before he can say anything.

  When I pull into my parking spot, I hear my phone ring and then answer it before checking the caller ID. "Yeah?"