Into The Night

we can print such glorified crap about a man who is the epitome of scum is beyond me,” she muttered beneath her breath.

“Excuse me?” Sharon asked sharply.

Nicole came to an abrupt stop and squeezed her eyes closed in frustration, knowing she’d overstepped boundaries she never should have crossed at work. The hostile words had just slipped out of her mouth uncensored, and even though she knew she shouldn’t have said anything derogatory, she wasn’t about to apologize for the truth.

She faced Sharon, who’d crossed her arms over her breasts and looked none too happy about Nicole’s disparaging comment.

Well, tough shit, Nicole thought. She wasn’t about to sugarcoat her feelings about the situation, or Sloane, even if it meant getting her walking papers for speaking her mind. There were some things she refused to compromise, and one was her integrity.

“I wrote that feature on Sloane and his contribution to the women’s shelter because I didn’t have a choice,” she stated without apology. “As a journalist, I know I have to be unbiased on whatever subject I’m writing about, despite my own personal opinions and feelings, and that’s exactly what I did with Sloane. But it literally made me sick to glorify what he wants everyone to believe was an altruistic, compassionate gesture toward abused women when that’s exactly what he does. The man is a hypocrite when it comes to promoting his public perception, and I hate that I had to support his duplicity.”

Sharon’s gaze widened in shock at Nicole’s outspoken condemnation of Preston Sloane. “You don’t know any of that for a fact,” she replied carefully.

Oh, but she did. Nicole had up-close, personal, heartbreaking knowledge of Sloane’s operations. As much as she wanted to enlighten Sharon, she didn’t dare. Not only did she not want her editor to know what she was doing on the side, but Nicole wasn’t about to jeopardize Nathan’s case in any way.

Still, she wasn’t willing to let the subject die just yet. “Can you honestly say you haven’t heard rumblings about his preference for underage girls?”

“I won’t confirm or deny anything, and it’s not your job to go digging in that direction, either,” Sharon warned, and ended the discussion by walking out of the conference room.

No, it wasn’t Nicole’s place to dig into such a controversial story as an entertainment writer for The Las Vegas Commentary. But what she did on her own private time was her own business. Someone had to help those girls who’d succumbed to Sloane’s promises of affection and material possessions, and Nicole was committed to doing whatever it took to rescue Angela this weekend, and to save any other girl who wanted out.

* * *

He’d promised to protect her. He’d promised to make sure she was safe and guarded. And she died. Murdered. Her senseless death was all because he’d failed to shield her from the evil stalking her, waiting for the chance to end her life before she could testify.

With a strangled gasp, Nathan shot upright in bed, his body damp with sweat and his heart pounding hard and fast in his chest. He forced the haunting images from his mind, but the awful sense of grief and failure remained, and he feared it always would.

“Nathan?” Nicole stirred on the bed beside him, her sleepy voice tinged with concern. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he lied, his throat raspy and raw. “I’m fine. Go back to sleep.”

Knowing any chance of rest would elude him after that rude awakening, Nathan got out of bed, pulled on a pair of sweatpants, and headed into the living room so he didn’t disturb Nicole by tossing and turning for the rest of the night.

Standing at the floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the bright lights of the Strip, he splayed his hand on the cool pane of glass and exhaled a soul-deep sigh that did nothing to ease his guilt. The pain of the past still sliced deep, and with the pressure of getting Angela out of Sloane’s estate this weekend messing with his psyche, was it any wonder the nightmares had returned?

He curled his hand into a fist and cursed Caleb for giving him this case, for forcing him to relive his past and the mistakes he’d made that had cost a young girl her life. Yet despite Caleb’s tough-love approach, Nathan was committed to doing the job, and this time making damn sure no one got hurt in the process. There was no way he’d be able to face Angela’s father if anything happened to her. He was determined to reunite Angela with her family, and give her back her life. Give her a future.

“Nathan? What’s going on?”

Nicole’s soft, caring voice drifted from behind him, and when her fingertips lightly touched his tense back he instinctively flinched away. He immediately regretted the harsh reaction, and when he turned around to face her he hated that he’d been the one to put that hurt look in her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said gruffly, and noticed that she’d put on one of his gray T-shirts, which looked exceptionally good on her. “I just have a lot on my mind.”

“Like what?” she persisted.

He shook his head. “Nothing you need to worry about.”

She pursed her lips in annoyance, his dismissive words seemingly making her more determined to discover what had driven him from their bed in the middle of the night. “I can’t just go back to sleep when I know something’s wrong,” she said, searching his gaze for answers.

He looked away. “Just leave it alone,” he said, even though he knew the inquisitive reporter in her wouldn’t drop the subject so easily. She sensed a story, and uncovering it was second nature to her.

And he knew she was damn good at her job.

“It’s this case, isn’t it?” she asked, her voice firm with conviction as she managed to home in on what was weighing so heavily on his mind. “It’s personal for you, just as it is for me. I’ve sensed that from the very beginning. What I’d like to know is how and why?”

“It’s ugly,” he said, as if that could scare her into backing off.

She crossed her arms over her chest and held her ground. “Everything about this case is ugly and repulsive and horrifying. But right now we’re partners, and I’m not some fragile woman who can’t handle the truth. There’s nothing you could tell me that would shock me, or make me think any differently of the man you are.”

He wasn’t so sure. Hadn’t one woman turned her back on him when he’d needed her support the most? Then again, he knew deep in his gut that Nicole was the complete opposite of Jill, in every way that mattered. Her strength. Her fortitude. Her ability to be vulnerable, yet courageous enough to stand up for what she believed in.

She settled on the cushion next to his. “Why is this case so important to you?” she asked, her tone much softer now.

He could have denied everything, but he couldn’t bring himself to lie to her. She deserved to know the truth about him, and if he was honest with himself, he no longer wanted to carry the burden of his past alone. And trusting Nicole came easily, because he knew she’d never betray his confidence.

He looked at her. The living room was dark, but the glow from the lights of the city gave him just enough illumination to see the caring in her expression, the need to understand what drove him, and a tenderness that affirmed the undeniable connection between them.

“This is my chance to right a wrong,” he said, his voice filled with so much pain it hurt to speak. “During my last undercover assignment as a vice cop, I was sent in with a few other guys in my department to infiltrate a prostitution ring. We were to gather enough evidence to bring down the leader, Paulo Rodriguez, and break up the organization. It took months to work my way in, and what I saw during that time turned my stomach. The young girls, the drugs and abuse, the sex trafficking. It was beyond anything I could have imagined.”

He dragged a hand down the side of his face and along the taut set of his jaw before continuing. “A lot of the victims were runaways, but others had been either lured in with promises of modeling careers and money, or just abducted right off the streets.”

Nicole pressed her fingers to her lips, her eyes wide as she listened to the shocking reality of what he’d