“You haven’t given me anything to be serious about yet.”
“Denton, she’s been lying to you. Right from the very beginning. Her name’s not even Chloe Tamworth, although I don’t know what it is.”
“How convenient. Anything else? You going to tell me she’s not a natural blonde as well, because I already know that. Carpet doesn’t match the drapes, if you get my meaning.”
“You’re sleeping with her?” James asked.
“Of course I’m sleeping with her. You’ve seen her. How could I not be?”
That’s the sort of answer I would usually give. Lighthearted, casual, like it was just sex. That’s all it was. So far.
“You need to end it,” James said urgently. He sounded panicked now, scared even.
“No way. Now, if there’s nothing else…”
“Chloe’s an FBI agent, Denton. She’s been working undercover spying on you this entire time.
I laughed. Then I stopped. Then I laughed again.
There weren’t many other possible reactions when someone tells you that Chloe was an FBI agent. I couldn’t think of anyone less capable of being undercover agent. Perhaps ‘capable’ wasn’t the right word. Chloe had proved herself to be intelligent, and I wouldn’t put anything past her, but there was still no way she was working for the FBI.
Impossible.
“You need to take this seriously,” James insisted.
“Yeah, sure James, I’ll take it seriously.”
Then I saw something that I did take very seriously indeed. My phone flashed up with an email from a contact I had placed in charge of watching Roddy.
We should close out this deal tonight, or the other party’s going to walk. They’re a tough negotiator, but we can definitely do a deal if we move soon.
Shit. Shit, I needed more time.
“James, I have to go. Something urgent has just come up.”
“Think about what I said, Denton,” James warned as I hung up the phone.
We should close out this deal tonight, or the other party’s going to walk meant that Roddy was leaving town soon and I had to act now.
They’re a tough negotiator, but we can definitely do a deal if we move soon meant Roddy’s team was armed, but we could still take them.
So much for a nice dinner with Chloe.
I had to take care of Roddy. Chloe would hate me, but I could win her back round. This was more important. I couldn’t let Roddy escape. Not after what he had done to Kara.
I pulled out my keys and unlocked the top drawer of my desk.
I hated guns, but they served a purpose. I slipped it under my jacket and left the office.
The next time I saw Chloe, Roddy would be dead and we could start fresh with no baggage.
I smiled one final time, before getting serious. FBI agent? What had James been smoking?
Apparently an upskirt picture of me in my damp panties wasn’t enough to get Denton to come to dinner on time. I should be mad, but the overriding emotion was desire. The longer he made me wait, the more I’d want to jump him the second he walked through the door.
That was probably the entire point. I bet there wasn’t even an urgent conference call he had to lead. He probably just wanted to tease me and make sure I was slick with wetness when he finally came over.
I’d only given him one job, and that was to buy the wine. Guess I had to do that myself now. The food still needed another thirty minutes in the oven. That was more than enough time to pop over to the liquor store across the road and grab a bottle of red. It would be a lot cheaper than whatever Denton would have purchased, but I was used to cheap wine, and it was his own fault for bailing on me.
I ran outside, quickly crossed the road and purchased a bottle of red wine. It barely took five minutes. As I crossed the street on the way back, I noticed a familiar face.
It was her; the woman I saw outside the office a week or so ago. Why on Earth would she be outside my apartment? I’d assumed she was following Denton, but there was no way she could know he was coming here tonight.
Lois might have put a handler on me to make sure I didn’t get too close to Denton, but if this woman was an FBI agent she needed a lot more training on how to tail someone effectively and without them noticing. She was also too pretty to be undercover tailing someone. Every man who walked past gave her a second glance, and then a third.
For the time being at least, I was an FBI agent, and that meant I should have the confidence to approach someone who appeared to be following me.
She looked away as I approached the entrance to my building, but I went straight past the door and walked up next to her.
“Excuse me,” I said politely. “This probably sounds a little odd, but I could swear I know you from somewhere. Did you go to school at St. Thomas in New York?” I had no idea if there even was a St. Thomas school in New York, but that wasn’t the point.
“No,” she replied, and suddenly looked like she would rather be anywhere else but here with me. She tried to move away, but I kept alongside her.
“Are you sure? What’s your name?”
She paused before answering. “Ashlee Williams,” she said uncertainly, as if it were the first time she’d ever said it. It probably was.
“I’m Chloe Tamworth,” I said. I wanted to see if she recognized that name. If she did, I would know she had been sent by Lois, because not many people knew me by the name Tamworth.
I got a reaction from her, but it wasn’t the one I was expecting.
“You’re Chloe Tamworth?” she asked. “Tamworth?”
“Yes, why?”
“Nevermind. I, uh, I need to be going. Nice speaking to you.”
She pushed past me and half walked, half jogged down the street, checking over her shoulder to make sure that I wasn’t following her.
That was weird to say that least.
I headed back upstairs and poured myself a glass of wine, even though according to Denton’s message he wouldn’t be here for another hour at least. I needed something to calm my nerves. That confrontation had left me more on edge than I cared to admit.
My cell phone--the real one--rang from my bedroom. That likely meant it was either Lois or my mom. I wasn’t sure which was worse, but when I saw it was Mom calling I relaxed slightly, so she must have been the lesser of two evils right now.
“Oh wow, you answered your phone,” Mom said before I could even greet here.
“Hi Mom. I’m actually kind of busy right now. I’m cooking dinner.”
“By cooking, do you mean microwaving?”
“No, I’m using the oven and gas stove and everything. I don’t want to get distracted and burn the food.”
“What are you making?”
I read the name of the recipe from the website directions that I was following religiously. “Fresh pasta with a pesto sauce, and bruschetta.”
“That’s fancy,” Mom remarked. “What’s his name?”
“Whose name?”
“The man you’re cooking dinner for. I don’t believe for one second that you’re doing all this for yourself. I assume you have a date tonight.”
“He’s just a friend, Mom.”
“If you say so dear. I’ll let you get on with it. I only called to see how you were getting on, but it sounds like things are going well.”
Mom was just about to hang up when I called her name. There was something I wanted to talk to her about.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“If this is about what underwear you should wear tonight then I’m probably not the best person to ask. It’s been awhile since I’ve needed to--”
“No, Mom, it’s not that.” Although I was starting to doubt the power of my pretty pink panties, now that Denton had been able to easily resist the photos I sent him earlier. “I had a question about Dad.”
“Okay,” Mom replied, more softly this time. She always did her best to answer my questions, but it was never easy.
“When he needed the kid
ney transplant, Grandma and Grandad both wanted to be donors, didn’t they? I mean, they went through all the tests and everything.”
“Yeah, of course. They would have both done anything to save him. You always do for your kids.”
“But they weren’t a match?”
This time Mom paused before answering. “No.”
“That’s odd, isn’t it? Parents are usually a match for their kids.”
“I think so, yes, but…” She trailed off as if she’d lost her train of thought.
“But... “
“I don’t want you to think ill of your grandmother, but, well I’ve always wondered whether perhaps your grandfather wasn’t really your dad’s father. That would explain why he wasn’t a match. Plus, it’s not as if they looked much alike.”
That was true enough. Dad didn’t look anything like his father, but not all kids did look like their parents. You couldn’t read too much into it.
“Grandma always did seem the free-spirited type,” I admitted.
“That’s one way of putting it.”
Mom hadn’t had the strongest relationship with her mother-in-law while she’d been alive, but they’d always been civil to each other while she was alive.
“That wouldn’t explain why Grandma wasn’t a match for Dad,” I said. “I doubt she faked giving birth.”
“No, I suppose not. I don’t know. I don’t think it’s worth worrying about now, dear. They both did the tests, and I was there when the doctor said they didn’t match. They would have done all they could to save your father. You know that.”
“Yeah, I know. Thanks Mom. I’d better get back to this meal.”
“Good luck, darling. Be safe.”
“I think I can cook a meal without injuring myself.”
“I was referring to what happens after the meal.”
I couldn’t see her, but I’m pretty sure she winked as she said it.
“Night, Mom.”
Before I put the phone down, I checked my emails to see if Denton had been in touch. He hadn’t emailed my personal account--personal, as in, heavily monitored by the FBI--but we often used the work account to communicate. A few staff in the IT department might know we were sleeping together, but that was better than having all my messages read by Lois.
Denton hadn’t emailed me, but as his PA, I had access to all of his emails as well.
Just before delaying dinner, he’d received a cryptic email flagged as urgent. You didn’t have to be an FBI agent to work out the code.
I knew why Denton was late for dinner.
I was going to kill him. That is, if Roddy hadn’t got there first.
I’d fucked up.
Again.
The second I’d received the email about Roddy, I’d left the office and jumped in my car, before driving well in excess of the speed limit all the way to his house out of town.
I’d arrived in less than an hour. The second I stepped out of the car, I’d entered something resembling a trance. I didn’t have control of my own body anymore. It was like I’d given instructions to a robot and now the robot was going to carry them out. I just happened to be looking through its eyes.
As I walked up the driveway towards the house, I didn’t felt any of the emotions I’d expected to feel at this stage. I wasn’t excited or nervous. I wasn’t anxious, and I definitely wasn’t scared.
I was just a man on a mission. A mission that, once completed, would mark the end of the worst chapter of my entire life and hopefully the beginning of the best chapter. That was, if Chloe could ever forgive me.
She had to. I’d make her understand what I’d done. I’d beg for forgiveness until she let me back into her life. But right now, I had a job to do.
I’d been so intent on getting into the house that I hadn’t even bothered to do a sweep for security. I got lucky. A guard--armed--appeared from around the corner, but I was able to duck behind a bush just before he turned to look in my direction.
The guard kept walking around the front of the house. He had a casual gait, almost as if he were just out for an evening stroll with his AK-47 to burn off some calories after dinner.
I waited for ten minutes to monitor the patrols, but there were only two men, and they walked so slowly that getting into the house would be easy. There might be more men inside, but given how laid back they appeared, I fancied my chances.
I didn’t even need to go in the front door. One of the upper windows was open and I would easily be able to climb up there by getting on the lower window, then going across to the porch over the door, and then up through the window. Piece of cake.
This was going to be easy. In hindsight, that should have sounded some alarm bells, but I was too focused on killing Roddy to pay any attention.
It was a trap, and I walked straight into it.
I clambered in through the window into a dark room. I’d assumed it was empty, but I heard movement in the far corner. The second my foot touched the floor, two men stood up and pointed guns at me.
I’d have been dead if I hadn’t got my foot caught in the curtains and tripped over. The men fired into an empty space, but it took them a while to notice they had missed their target. In that time, I managed to scramble over and disarm one of them.
I smashed his head against the wall, knocking him out cold, and then grabbed his gun before firing two bullets into the other guy.
I think I left him alive, although I couldn’t say for certain. He didn’t get a shot off at me as I left, but then most people who’d been shot were in no position to shoot back. Life was not like the movies in that respect.
Roddy wasn’t here, so there was no point searching the house. He wouldn’t put himself at risk by being in the same house as an attempt on my life.
I ran back to the car and drove straight to my place to get cleaned up. I couldn’t get changed without Chloe knowing I’d lied about where I was, but if there were any specks of blood on me I’d need to get them cleaned up.
As I was strolling quickly down the hall towards my apartment, I sent Chloe a quick message to let her know I’d be there soon.
When I looked up from my phone I saw Chloe standing outside my apartment.
She looked pissed.
-*-
“Chloe. What are you doing here?”
“Waiting for you,” she replied. “Open the door.”
This couldn’t be good. She looked mad. Madder than she would be if I had just been a few hours late for dinner.
I opened the door and let her in, while quickly checking myself out in the mirror by the door. There didn’t appear to be any visible blood, so that was something. I might still be able to keep my whereabouts a secret.
“You went to Barton’s place and killed him,” Chloe yelled.
Perhaps not.
I couldn’t lie about where I’d been. She knew.
“I went there to talk to him. That’s all. And he wasn’t there anyway.”
“No. You went there to kill him. Don’t lie to me.”
Before I could dig myself any deeper, Chloe stepped forward and wrapped her arm around my waist. For one sweet moment, I thought she was going to hug me and we would be done arguing. No such luck.
Her hand went straight to the gun strapped to the back of my belt.
“Do you always take a gun with you when you go to talk?”
“Chloe, I can explain.”
“There’s no need. I understand perfectly well what’s going on here. I thought… I thought you cared about me. I thought you felt something. God, I sound so fucking naive.”
“I do care about you. You know I do.”
“Just not enough to do the one thing I asked. Was it really that big a request? I was asking you not to murder someone. It’s hardly unreasonable.”
“He’s not just ‘someone,’ Chloe. He’s fucking Roddy Barton. He deserves to die.”
“That’s not your choice to make. But you made the choice anyway. I hope you’re happy with the outcome.”
I reached out to grab her arm, but she saw me coming and deflected my arm with surprising ease. She must have had self-defense classes. When would I learn to stop underestimating her?
Chloe fled my apartment and made it clear that I shouldn’t follow her.
Now I had the worst of both worlds. Roddy Barton was still alive, and Chloe was mad at me anyway. At least if I’d killed Roddy I would be able to take some consolation from Chloe not speaking to me.
But even that wouldn’t be enough. Chloe was right; I’d made my choice and it was the wrong one. Even killing Roddy wouldn’t compensate for seeing the look of pure vitriol on Chloe’s face when she looked at me.
She’d hate me forever if I killed Roddy in cold blood. I wanted him dead, but for the first time, I realized it wasn’t worth it. Nothing was worth losing Chloe over.
I might be too late, but I had to try.
I wasn’t about to give Chloe up without a fight.
Was I being a hypocrite?
Probably. I’d yelled at Denton for not doing the one thing I asked of him, but who was I to make requests?
I was the one who’d been spying on him for three weeks. I’d probably be pulled off the case soon. I hardly recorded any of my conversations with Denton, and the ones I did send across were bland and uneventful.
Lois would know I spent the night at his place recently. The fact that she hadn’t even tried to talk to me about it suggested it couldn’t have come as less of a surprise.
I didn’t care anymore. I just wanted to be off this case and away from Denton. Away from Chicago. Away from everything that reminded me of Denton. I wouldn’t forget him in a hurry, but I had to start trying to put him in my past.
That would be a lot easier if he wasn’t banging at my door and yelling for me to let him in. He must have taken all of thirty minutes to cool off and think about it, before coming round here and making a scene.
“Let me in, Chloe. We need to talk.”
I had plenty I wanted to say to him, but I’d left his apartment for a reason. If I’d stayed any longer I would have burst into tears, and I didn’t want him to see me like that.
I also didn’t want all my neighbors to hear an angry man pounding on my door.
Revenge: A Bad Boy Romance Page 15