Fighting With Light (The Coldwell Brothers #2)

20. Liam

20

Liam

When we got back to the house, Aelia and I plopped in front of the computer together. “Are you sure you’re comfortable? I can move a couch over here or we can move to the living room. It will take me a second, but if you would rather do that...” I trail off.

“Why are you so concerned about me sitting in this comfortable chair next to you?”

I study Aelia for a moment with her feet tucked up under her. She has shorts and a baggie t-shirt on with her hair on top of her head. “I’m not. I just…want to make sure you’re comfortable.”

She smiles and grips my forearm, her long nails gently dragging across my skin.

“I’m good, Tarzan, so what do you want me to do?”

“Can you keep watching footage we recorded? While you’re doing that, I’ll hack back into Ferreira’s clothing company and sift through the shipping invoices to see if any larger shipments are being sent out. I’m hoping I’ll find something useful.”

“Okay, I can do that.” She shifts around and hits the space bar for the footage, and I get to work looking for clues.

It doesn’t take me long to hack into the clothing company, but it takes a while for me to go through all the paperwork they have. At first glance, it just looks like a successful clothing company that ships worldwide, but digging deeper, I think it’s a front based on the money going in and out. The only problem is it’s hard to prove because they make luxury clothing, so seeing a box of fifty shirts worth twenty thousand US dollars isn’t unusual. I cross-checked the shirt, and it retails for a thousand per piece. It’s not like they take pictures of what’s going into the box prior to getting it packed up. The only way to prove anything is to open a box and go from there. I can’t trust that the weights listed are correct either, but this is the only legitimate lead that we have potentially connecting Marco Costa and Fred Coldwell. Or I’m just digging the wrong hole and we’ll have to start at square one again.

Aelia gasps and hits the space bar so hard it makes me wince. I’ll have to replace those keys if she keeps doing that. She hits the button to rewind, then hits the space bar again. “There, that’s different. I haven’t seen a truck like that go in there yet. All of them have been semis or those shipping containers, not a white truck like that.”

I type in the tags to Portugal’s equivalent of a Bureau of Motor Vehicles and it comes up as a truck for a rental company. I go to the rental company and see who rented the truck, and it’s a man I’ve never seen listed on paperwork before for the clothing company. Reverse searching his name, he’s a nobody. His name, or face, doesn’t pop up on international databases. He’s clean, too clean.

“Do you think he works for Ferreira?” Aelia asks.

“Not sure, but he’s clean, no speeding tickets, he’s not married, no kids.”

“A lot of the guys that work for my father are like that. Some of them have families, though.”

“I’m not sure a family is an indicator of a made man, but maybe his clean record is. He would skate past under the radar, which is what you would need to work for a mobster.”

“Works for my dad,” Aelia sighs.

“Well, it’s our first lead. Now I just have to wait for the shipping yard to upload the shipping manifest and designate a container so we know if it’s Ferreira’s.”

“You can do all of that right here?” she asks.

I dip my chin and start running my malware program to go around the shipping yard firewall, which is not nearly as strong as it should be.

“It shouldn’t take me long. But I think we’re onto something because Ferreira’s clothing company had both hardware firewalls and software firewalls, which is unusual unless you are very concerned about someone getting into your system. They also did backwards encryption, which again, is unusual for a clothing company. That kind of security is found with defense contractors. I mean, I got around it, of course, but it made me feel like they are hiding something.” I glance at Aelia and she’s looking at me with a confused expression on her pretty face. “What?”

“I have no clue what you just said, but can you get the information we need or not?”

I chuckle and pat her thigh. “Yes, I can get it. It just might take me a second because I have to find the paperwork on Ferreira’s end to cross check it.”

“How long is that going to take?” she asks.

I glance at my other screen, and then it dings, signaling the successful crack for the shipping yard.

“Not long,” I mumble, and search for shipping paperwork from this truck.

An intake sheet was submitted about an hour ago and it matches the other clothing manifests. Then, on the third page, I spot the box with the same weight and designation as the others that appeared on past shipping manifests. It’s always the exact size, weight, and designation. Everything else is too inconsistent. “I think they are going to ship this out tomorrow,” I mumble to Aelia.

“Wait, does that mean we have to go tonight?” I nod, still looking at the form.

“If we wait until tomorrow, I think we’ll miss our window.”

Aelia stands from her chair. “So are we doing the ninja thing or my idea?”

I look up at her. She’s ready to go, whatever it takes, and a smile grows on my face.

“I think your idea is going to work.”

Her face breaks into a wide, sparkling smile, and she kisses me on the lips before running out of the office.

“I have to look the part!” she yells. Chuckling, I stare at the empty doorway before I go back to double-checking everything, to be sure. It would make me feel better if I had confirmation that this is what we are looking for, but I don’t and I have no other way to get it. Regardless, I refuse to think about our plan going south, but at least we have guns, which makes me only less apprehensive. I push away the fact that I have a major surfing competition tomorrow because this has to be done, and we can’t waste any time. God help us.

***

“Liam!” Aelia yells.

I go to her room and she wasn’t there, but it looks like her suitcase exploded.

“Where are you?” I yell.

“In the master!” she yells back. I make my way into my room, and she’s holding up two of my suit jackets. I bring suits just in case. Surfing press conferences aren’t in suits, but I was raised always having one on hand because you never know when you’re going to need it. I guess Mom was right about yet another thing.

“What are you doing?”

She glances at me before returning to the two Brioni bespoke suits. “These are beautiful. I’m trying to figure out which one will make you look more like my chauffeur.”

I chuckle and sit on the edge of the bed.

“Well neither, seeing as each of the jackets is easily ten grand, well I suppose the entire suit was close to twenty-five. I don’t remember.”

“Do you think the man sitting at the security station to the shipping yard is going to know anything about a twenty thousand dollar suit? No, the answer is no.”

“If you say so,” I say, looking at her in her silky robe tied around her body and her makeup dark around her eyes. “So what is this look you’re going for? Do you expect makeup to convince someone to believe you?”

She shoots me a you’re an idiot look .

“What?” Of all the things I’ve done, playing dress up to get information is not one of them. I guess there is a first time for everything, and a lot of those first-time things seem to be only associated with Aelia.

“Men,” she sighs .

“Yes, I’m a man. Thank you for noticing.” I grin and wink.

She rolls her eyes and drops one jacket before going back to the closet to hang the other. “When you are trying to convince someone you are who you say you are, you can’t just act the part; you have to look it. And if I look like I’m a frantic designer from a fashion house that may have made a mistake with drippy eye makeup and disheveled designer clothes, then yes, I think someone is more likely to believe me.”

“You talk as if you’ve done this before.”

She shrugs and goes back to my closet, returning with a black button-up shirt. “I mean, I haven’t done anything like this, but back in the day when I was in school, me and some friends were underage, and we used to sneak into clubs.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t just because they knew who your father was and they didn’t want to tell you no for fear of getting shot in the head?”

Her hands drop, and she looks away for a moment. “I hadn’t considered that,” she mumbles.

“Well, we’re in it now, so we just have to sell it.”

She turns her head back and forth, and pushes her shoulders back. “Trust me, I can sell it.”

I reach for her, tugging her to stand between my legs and rest my hands on her hips. She seems to get the picture and straddles my legs. The corners of her mouth tip up as she looks down at me. With my head leaned back, I mirror her amusement as warmth floods my veins. I’m at a loss for words. I don’t know what to say, and I always have something quippy to say. But right now, she is overwhelming to me. Like when I know a massive wave is coming my way and there is slight hesitation that I can’t handle it, but the excitement and adrenaline pumping through my veins gives me the confidence to just go for it, lean into it, and hope for the best. Or like a difficult climb I’m not sure I can complete, but my determination is stronger than my doubt, and I refuse to be scared, and I use the fear to channel it into completing a climb.

That’s how I feel about Aelia. She’s a difficult wave or a climb because I’m starting to feel so much for her and I shouldn’t. But I’ve never shied away from a challenge and I’m not about to start now. The way she feels against me, around me, with me, is almost too much for a man like me. But I like that about her. She meets me at every turn, and then she pushes for more, she demands more from me, and who am I to give her less than she deserves?

Even if it’s temporary, Liam?

I push the voice in the back of my head away and kiss the skin between the flaps of her robe. Her dark, sweet cherry scent fills my nose and makes my mouth water. I wish I could lick it off her body. I pepper light kisses over and below her collarbone.

She sighs and drags her hands through my long hair. “You know this is kind of funny,” she says.

I lean back to look her in the eye because I don’t know what she’s talking about.

“I’ve wanted you from the moment I met you. Yet…we never seem to get there.”

I chuckle and shake my head. “I guess we haven’t, have we?” I say and lean my head into her chest.

Her hands come back to my hair and her long nails scrape at my scalp. I have to swallow the groan because it feels so good. The intimacy of holding someone you have no business caring about is yet another aspect of these overwhelming feelings, but I’m still leaning in.

“Honestly, we’ve been too busy or tired. I just think it’s funny because there was a day when that was my only goal with you. And yours was to get me close enough so you could get information. The tide has changed for both of us, I suppose,” she says.

“If you remember correctly, I did mention that you and I should attempt to be better than others perceive us to be,” I tell her.

She nods and hugs my head closer to her chest. “I didn’t forget. But why should I care what other people think of me?”

“You shouldn’t, Aelia. It’s more about what you think of yourself. My brothers think I’m a smart idiot. Granted, I have made myself out to be that way, but they haven’t seen through that because I haven’t let them. I don’t want to be that guy anymore. Nor do I want them to think I just travel the world, surf, climb, and sleep with random women. I want to be different.”

Her hands pause and she grips my hair, forcing my head back. “So being with me temporarily and building a case against our fathers is your way of proving them wrong?”

I shrug and lay my cheek against her chest. I can feel each dull thud of her heart as it pounds against her bone, and it calms my own. It makes me feel like this isn’t one-sided.

“You don’t think they will take you seriously, do you?”

I close my eyes and take another deep breath of her, trying to relax the tightness in my throat. I can’t answer her question because I don’t know what the answer is. I know my family loves me and wants me safe while I’m out on my own. It bothers Mom to no end, but this is just how it is.

Aelia keeps running her hands through my hair, making my eyes drop. I refuse to live my life waiting for my dad to do something. Sure, it makes me a little paranoid because I have to watch my own back and my brothers aren’t just a twenty-minute drive away. I mean, I know if I called them, they would be on a plane and get to me as soon as they could, but time would not be on our side.

Part of me wonders if I’ll be alone forever because of my family situation. I don’t like the idea of getting women involved in my life beyond the casual. Especially now because I saw what happened with Kai and Cordi, I would have been beside myself trying to protect Cordi. When those men broke into their house, it scared me, and I don’t like thinking about the man I would have become. It would have been worse than the one I am.

But Aelia understands that darker side of humanity because she was born in it. The only difference is she doesn’t like it, but she accepts that she’s in it, and once you are in it, there is no getting out.

Marco Costa signed her life on the dotted line the moment she was born, just like mine was. We don’t get to choose our families, but we do have a choice not to bring anyone else into the chaos .

I’m afraid of the man I will become being alone. The life I’ve lived has kept those fears at bay until now. Surfing and climbing are not forever. It’s not something I could easily do at eighty-years-old.

If I live that long.

But maybe I won’t, and it wouldn’t be an issue then. Regardless, it’s not something I thought about until now.

“Hey, where did you go?” she asks.

I lean back away from her warm body and her eyebrows scrunch together. The concern in her eyes makes me angry. I don’t deserve it, and I want to throw her off of me, but I don’t. I shake my head and tap her thigh.

“I’m good, let’s get ready,” I rasp.

Still holding onto me, she dips down, pressing her lips to mine.

“This is going to be fun,” she says, smiling against my mouth.

I grin back because she shouldn’t be excited. She should be nervous. But I’m excited, too.

Maybe we’re both just a little crazy.