by Lexi Blake
“You didn’t look fine,” Tucker said. “Are you feeling all right? Is it physical or is it the pure horror of actually having a woman blow you off? That’s not the same as blowing you. It’s kind of…”
Yeah, he got it. “The opposite. Did McDonald combine your bloody brains when she was playing about in them?”
“You have to admit, not many women turn you down,” Robert mused. “It’s got to be tough on the old ego. I’m perfectly fine with it. I’ve been turned down lots of times.”
“Only because you tended to go after unavailable women,” Tucker pointed out. “I, on the other hand, go in for the kill. Not really a kill. By that I meant the sure thing.”
“You mean hookers,” Owen shot back.
Tucker didn’t bother to look ashamed. He merely grinned. “They never turn me down.”
Rebecca Walsh wasn’t a hooker, and she’d totally turned him down. It rankled. No. It didn’t rankle. He was at least going to be honest with himself, even if he lied to everyone else.
It hurt.
“She’s going to Jax’s on Saturday?” He wasn’t about to give up, and it wasn’t entirely about the op. Apparently she was bonding pretty well with Jax and River. It would be easy for them to keep her occupied while he and Robert searched her place. But that wasn’t how he wanted this to go.
Because he wanted her.
“That’s what he said,” Robert replied. “She’s told River she would be there. That’s where we were all supposed to meet and show off what a great couple we were, how crazy our manly love was. Now I guess I’m going as your sidekick. Mostly I’m going to see if she blows you off again.”
“I wish I got to go,” Tucker said, a frown on his face. “River makes good lasagna. Did I mention Ezra doesn’t have any food in our place? Do you think I could find a hooker who can also cook? I would pay extra.”
“Get yourself a freaking frozen dinner like the rest of the single male world. You are a coddled baby,” a deep voice said and Ezra Fain was suddenly there, like he’d peeled away from the shadows. No one Owen had ever met moved as quietly as Ezra. “And I thought I told you to stay away from here.”
Yeah, he was starting to worry that having the lads around constantly would tip off Becca that something was going on. All they needed was Jax to feel the man vibe going on down here and heed its call to have them all in one place. He discounted Dante and Sasha since they didn’t believe in rising before noon.
“Nina told us the doc always heads out before seven. I was safe enough,” Tucker explained. “And Carter texted me asking if I can take a few extra shifts. He slid in that he was going in to work with Dr. Walsh this morning. He’s got a thing for Owen’s girl.”
“For Owen’s brief fling?” Robert was an arsehole who seemed to be enjoying this far too much.
Ezra frowned as he sat down next to Owen. “Brief? Because I thought that was our play now. Did Owen magically find our data? Did you go see her after I left last night?”
“Nope,” Robert answered. “The woman in question got her lick of the lollipop and now is moving on to other lollipops. She’s a kid in a candy store.”
But she hadn’t even touched his bloody lollipop, and he wanted her to. “She’s playing with me, that’s all. I’ll go see her tonight.”
Ezra shook his head. “No. You play this slow. If you go after her too soon, she might run the other way. Nod and smile at her the next time you see her and walk on. Saturday night you can make your play.”
He could be patient. Sort of. “I’ll have her again Saturday night. You’ll see. If I don’t get my hands on her again, I’ll pay up on whatever bets you have going, and don’t tell me you don’t, you bastards.”
They all tried to look innocent.
It was his turn to frown. “You, too, Ezra?”
The boss shrugged. “Hey, the days are long and Dante has cash stashed. I’m not getting paid by the government anymore. Speaking of the CIA, I came here to tell you that Levi Green’s gone missing.”
Shite. Exactly what he needed, that bugger running about town. “He’s here then.”
Ezra’s curt nod let Owen know that he agreed. “We had a couple of McKay-Taggart agents watching him. They couldn’t follow him past security at Dulles. According to passport services, he flew to Heathrow, but we all know he can manipulate those.”
Tucker looked serious all of the sudden. “Then it’s starting.”
They’d always known Green had a game plan. They were his pawns. But pawns could be quick. Pawns could maneuver in ways none of the stronger pieces could.
If only they could see the whole board in front of them.
“He’s using us to find what he can’t.” It was the only explanation.
“I agree. Theo Taggart is coming up this weekend,” Ezra said. “Big Tag is apparently making more small demons with his wife and he said something about ovulation that I didn’t want to hear, so he’s sending the Baby Tag.”
“I think we have to call Theo a mediumish Tag,” Tucker corrected. “There are a whole bunch of tiny Tags crawling around now. Is Erin coming with him?”
“I’m sure she will,” Ezra shot back. “Taggarts rarely travel without their wives. It’s like they’re tethered or something.”
How much of Ezra’s bitterness came from longing? It was a stupid thought and one he likely wouldn’t have had a few days before, but now he wondered if Ezra had once been “tethered” to Solo and how much he missed the feeling.
But that thought was drowned out by another. Theo and Erin were coming to town—the very people he’d hurt when he’d betrayed his team.
His gut rolled. He’d been careful to avoid them while they’d all been in Dallas. It hurt to look at that family and realize what he’d almost done to them. Little TJ Taggart would have grown up without a mum or dad if McDonald had been successful. It didn’t matter that Theo seemed unbothered by his presence.
As for Theo’s wife, he was sure Erin would have slit his throat if she’d had the chance. She was the savage one in that relationship, her violent tendencies only tamed by her love for her husband and son.
There were days he wished she would do it, that he would wake up one night and Erin Taggart would be looming over him like an avenging angel, her knife promising him sweet release. And if she wanted to torture him for a while, to flay the skin from his bones as he screamed, well, that would start to pay back what he owed.
“So we need to have something to tell them,” Ezra was saying. “I’ve got Jax trying to hunt down Levi.”
“He’ll be somewhere close to her, close to Becca,” Tucker said.
Owen shook his head. “He won’t get too close. If he could do this job himself, he wouldn’t have sent us to do it for him. I don’t think he’ll be content to sit back and watch. He’s got a plan.”
“He certainly did while we were in Bliss,” Tucker offered, but his light had dimmed. His jaw tightened, and Owen could briefly see the demons that lurked under his normally sunny surface.
It could be easy to forget that Tucker had a dark side. A seriously dark side. A side that had been tortured over and over again. And maybe he’d been on the other side of the needle at one point in time. Owen knew that was Tucker’s greatest fear, that he’d been callous and heartless, cruel and indifferent to the suffering of those around him.
Owen didn’t have to fear. He already knew he had that darkness in him.
He sat back and thought about the light he’d been in recently. When he’d reached out for Becca Walsh, there hadn’t been an ounce of dark between them. She’d been sunshine and she’d warmed his soul.
As Ezra started in on what they needed to do and Robert started getting paranoid about Levi taking off with Ariel, Owen sat back and sipped his coffee.
And plotted the seduction of Dr. Rebecca Walsh. He would get her out of that pretty cardigan and then they would see if she blew him off again.
Chapter Seven
“Thank you for coming up on a Saturd
ay.” Becca smiled at the intern. Annie showing up to help her out in the lab on a weekend seemed to be one of the only things going right for her.
That wasn’t true. The research was going great, and that should make her happy, but all she seemed able to think about was the fact that she’d passed Owen Shaw three times in the hall in the last few days and he’d said nothing but hello to her. And then walked on.
She should be cheering. She’d gotten away clean and there was no weirdness between them.
Yet here she was on a Saturday, hiding at work so she didn’t have to see if he was going on a date. Which was perverse because she had a date tomorrow. She’d agreed to Cathy’s plan and she was going through with it come hell or high water.
“They’re doing great, Dr. Walsh,” Annie said, who despite Carter’s insistence seemed incredibly smart and focused on her job. The young woman couldn’t be more than twenty-four, her blonde hair up in a ponytail and a ready smile on her face. “Kidney function is perfect in all the rats. The drug doesn’t seem to be affecting the liver either.”
Becca stared down at the reports. “Excellent. How did short-term memory perform?”
Annie handed her another set of files. “With the drug, they managed to make it through the maze two times faster than the control subjects. After three tries, memory function made them ten times faster.”
It was everything she’d hoped for. “Yes. That’s what I want to hear. The nerves are repairing themselves. The connections are coming back online once the drug clears the plaque out of the system.”
“Once you clear the plaque,” Annie said. “Dr. Walsh, this is remarkable. Don’t sell yourself short.”
“A lot of people helped work on this,” she murmured, uncomfortable with the praise. She didn’t give a shit about the prizes that would likely come if this worked out. The notoriety she would receive would be the worst part of her work.
She wasn’t looking for money and fame. She was in a war, and it finally hit her that she might be winning.
“Yeah, well, a lot of people didn’t have your ideas,” Annie said. “I’m going to be you when I grow up.”
She glanced up at the intern. “I’m like five years older than you.”
A slender shoulder shrugged. “Yeah, but you’re an actual adult. You don’t party and stuff. I’m still sowing a bunch of oats or something. That’s what my nana says. My mom just slut shames me and wants to know when I’m going to find a husband. She then tells me no man is going to want me if I don’t slow my roll.” She leaned in. “She means sex. I think if a guy can sleep with a bunch of people and have fun, then I should be able to, too. Not that you should. You should be here working and making the world a better place and stuff.”
Did everyone see her as some kind of boring, plain Jane, never-gets-out of the lab martyr? “I have fun.”
She’d damn straight had fun a few days before.
She kind of wished Owen had been the stripper she’d teased him about being. Then she could call and request his services. She wanted to celebrate and couldn’t think of a better way than watching Owen get naked.
Annie’s lips firmed as though she was holding in a chuckle and she nodded. “Of course you do. You simply have a different version of fun than a normal person. You’re a genius. You’re different from the rest of us.”
She groaned because she’d heard that her whole life. She was special. She was different because she’d been touched by God or something. Her big brain was a blessing and she had to ensure that she did everything she could to make herself worthy of it.
She was sick of being seen as some kind of goody-two-shoes brainiac. “Do you know what I did Wednesday, Annie?”
“Yes, Dr. Walsh. You came to work. You were in the lab most of the day and then you had to listen to Jimmy’s complete and utter failure of a trial. I saw the chick who wants to kill him. Her nose hair grew. I mean all the rest of it did too, but I was impressed at how fast that nose hair grew. You had a turkey sandwich for lunch at your desk and Cathy called in a chicken salad sandwich for your dinner from the Spadina Street café.” She shrugged again. “We all have your schedule in case Cathy has an emergency.”
God, she was boring. Well, she would have to fix that. “Was banging a hot Scot in an elevator on Cathy’s schedule? Because that was how my night went.”
Annie’s eyes went wide. “Seriously?”
She felt her face flush, but there was no going back. Besides, she wasn’t exactly ashamed. “His name was Owen and he was incredibly good stress relief.”
“I thought your shoulders seemed looser lately. Good for you, Dr. Walsh.”
Her shoulders weren’t the only thing that were loose. So was her tongue.
Annie leaned in, conspiratorially. “Who was he? I didn’t know we had a doctor from Scotland here. I thought the closest we had was the guy who’s really from Vancouver but does that bad British accent.”
Finally something she could jostle the girl with. “He’s not from the foundation. He lives in my building. He’s a bodyguard.”
Yep, those youthful eyes bore the stamp of pure shock. “You did a blue-collar guy?”
She had and it had been glorious. “I did. I’m getting back in the dating world, though I don’t guess getting trapped in an elevator counts as a date.”
“It sure seems to have ended like one,” Annie said. “Are you seeing him again? You know you don’t have to, right? It’s perfectly acceptable for you to have your fun and move on to greener pastures.”
“I’ve got a date tomorrow but not with him,” she admitted. Lawyer Larry texted her this morning and asked if he could call. They’d had a nice chat and lawyer number one of a hundred professionals Cathy was likely to parade in front of her seemed pretty nice. “I’m having lunch with a lawyer. I think that’s what I’ll do. I’ll take the alliterative approach to getting back out there. Lunch with lawyers. Dinner with doctors.”
Boning with bodyguards. Boffing with bodyguards. Bedtime with bodyguards.
Bodyguard. Bad boy. Except that bad boy had been awfully good.
Damn that man was in her head, but she wasn’t giving in.
“That sounds good,” Annie said with a smile. “Definitely stick to doctors and lawyers. They’re the only ones who truly understand the kind of hours we put in. Unless you’re looking for a good time. Then I can introduce you to some guys from the university who know what they’re doing.”
“I scarcely think Dr. Walsh needs to meet your friends, Annie,” Carter said from the doorway. She hadn’t heard him come in. “If you’re done with Dr. Walsh’s reports, why don’t you go and help in the lab. Dr. Holder had some patients coming in for baseline MRIs.”
Annie’s eyes rolled but she was all smiles when she turned around. “Sure thing.” She started for the door and then turned when she was behind Carter’s back and gave Becca the call me sign along with a far more juvenile gesture that let her know Annie was willing to hook her up.
With college boys.
Did Annie know any men with ridiculously broad shoulders and eyes as blue as any ocean? Did she know any guy rough enough to send a thrill along her spine and tender enough to make her stupid heart soften up?
She needed to work on her reputation if all anyone was going to send her way was either professionals looking for companionship or college boys who wanted to get laid.
“I apologize for her familiarity,” Carter said with a long-suffering sigh. “I go through this with them in their training classes.”
“She was being friendly,” Becca replied. “You should go easier on the interns. There might be a couple we want to keep, after all.”
“Certainly not Annie. She’s not serious about her work. She’ll find a husband, some meathead with a good paycheck, and settle down. I’ve seen it happen time and time again.”
“I hardly think medical school is the place to find a husband and never work again,” she shot back. Normally she would let it go, but there was something under
her skin today. “She’s worked hard and we should value that.”
If her little show of temper bothered him, he didn’t let her know. He simply laid out an envelope that had her name typed on the front of it. “I think you’ll like Tucker. He’s very respectful, and from what I can see, he knows his stuff. He’s assigned to Dr. Huisman right now, but I’ll snatch him up for you if I can. This came by courier.”
“On a Saturday?” She worked most Saturdays, but one of the things she liked about it was how she didn’t have to deal with administrative stuff. She didn’t get mail on weekends.
“I suppose whoever sent it knows you don’t take a lot of time off work,” he replied. “It was a bike messenger. Not the usual. He didn’t have me sign for it or anything.”
That was unusual to say the least. In her world there was always paperwork. Sometimes she expected the vending machines to need a signature to deliver a can of soda. She looked down at the plain white envelope in her hand. It wasn’t thick. Her name had been typed neatly on the front and there was nothing else distinguishing about it.
“Is there something wrong?” Carter asked. “I was about to run some errands. I’ll be back around six and we can head out together. If you like we can talk about your calendar for the next month. I’d like to get that on the books so the interns don’t make excuses about not having the schedule in time.”
She glanced up at the clock. She was supposed to be at River’s in a few hours. She was surprised to discover she wasn’t even thinking of canceling. It was what she usually did when it came to social events. She would say yes with all the good intentions in the world, and then the day would come and she would find some excuse to not put herself out there.
She wasn’t even thinking about it today. Today she was eager for some lasagna. It had been a long time since she’d had a home-cooked meal, and her stomach growled at the thought. “I’m heading out early. I have a party to go to.”