The door opened after one firm knock. “You wanted to see me?”
Bast glanced up in time to see Elijah Sterling, the newest member of the staff, walk in and shut the door behind him. Tall and lean, he radiated confidence even though he spent most of the day alone in an office. His Japanese mother had gifted him with his coal-black hair. An operation gone wrong from his time working for the Central Intelligence Agency gave him the faint scar along his jawline.
Coming off an attempt on his life and a violent disassembling of his undercover team that left only two alive—he and Becca—Eli was raw. Giving him a job and putting him in charge of surveillance and information gathering for the firm qualified as a risk, but Bast recognized a man who needed a true purpose. He’d seen it in Jarrett’s eyes a decade before and hoped Eli’s transition from trained killer to civilian would go half as well.
But the information Bast had to deliver threatened any progress. “We had a call from Natalie Udall.”
Elijah didn’t flinch. Didn’t show any reaction. Just stood with his arms folded in front of him. “That sounds bad.”
Bast drummed his fingers against the desk. When the tapping started clicking in his head, he stopped. He didn’t have many nervous reactions because he didn’t really get nervous about much, but tapping meant his mind was racing and he needed it to stop for second.
He motioned across the table. “Take a seat.”
This time Elijah exhaled. “So, it’s really bad then.”
“She’s leaving the company.” For some reason the word sounded better than “CIA” in Bast’s head.
The chair creaked as Eli sat down. “Okay.”
“She’s basically being run out.” Which was a nice way of saying she could be in the type of danger that ended with two bullets to the brain and a phony obituary talking about a sudden heart attack.
Eli picked at the seam on the armrest where the leather and wood met. “How does that impact me?”
Bast watched Eli’s fingers move. Looked like they both had a problem with wandering minds. “I think you know.”
“Because she took care of Todd?”
The word choice impressed Bast. Natalie had run Elijah’s team, at that time called Spectrum Industries and posing as a legitimate satellite company, even though it was an illegal op. The CIA didn’t have the authority to investigate U.S. citizens without a foreign threat. When the team leader, Todd Rivers, went bad, he tried to cover his tracks by wiping out Spectrum agents and shifting the blame to Becca. Natalie put an end to Todd and made it possible, with Bast’s negotiating assistance, for Becca and Eli to escape a life of being tracked and hunted.
Now it looked like the CIA higher-ups wanted to clean up the mess by dumping it at Natalie’s feet. If true, she’d become a burnable asset and that meant her life didn’t mean shit to her bosses.
“Natalie did make it possible for you and Becca to get away.” Not that Elijah needed that reminder, but Bast offered it anyway. “Apparently there are some who think people with your talents shouldn’t just be able to just quit the CIA.”
Elijah smiled. It was a rare sight and only lasted a second. “Go figure.”
“Well, you did pretend to be dead a few months ago.” All while hiding out in the living quarters above Jarrett’s club and investigating why life had blown up.
Bast still couldn’t believe Jarrett had stepped up to help after Becca and Elijah’s team had Jarrett arrested on trumped-up drug charges. But that happened more than nine months ago and was all resolved now. Jarrett had clearly forgiven Becca for double-crossing him, proving love was more than blind. It might just be stupid.
“I keep wondering why I bothered to stop pretending,” Elijah said.
“To work here with me, of course.”
Elijah snorted. “Right.”
“Anyway, Natalie is coming in to see me in a few days.” Bast watched for any signs of anger or panic but Eli had been well-trained to hide those, along with every other emotion bouncing around inside of him. That detachment saved his life many times but Bast knew it cost Eli something, too.
Eli leaned forward with his elbows balanced on his knees. “Why are you telling me all of this?”
“You know how this works. As we hammer out a deal for Natalie, other problems will come up. Your safety could be at issue because someone might want to blow your deal apart.”
Elijah tapped his fingertips together. “I can handle myself.”
The man had sniper skills and once commented on killing a guy with a pen, so Bast didn’t doubt the statement that from other men would be nothing more than a burst of empty ego. “No question, but I want us to be extra careful.”
Eli’s expression morphed from blank to questioning. His head tilted as he frowned. “Why do I think you’re leaving out some important facts here?”
Bast now knew what a bug felt like under a microscope. It wasn’t as if he could just spill what happened with Kyra and what might happen soon with Kyra and how that might add her to the list of people who needed protecting.
He fought to keep from shifting around in his chair. He was the boss after all. “Once I see Natalie I’ll have a better idea what we’re dealing with. Until then, stick close.”
“You think they’ll come after you?”
The guy was missing the main point of this little meeting. “No, Eli. After you.”
Eli slumped back in the chair. “Nothing about Natalie and her bunch scares me. I fought them once and won.”
“They tried to kill you, you crawled to Jarrett for help and he shot you. That was before you spent months hiding on his second floor.”
“Your point?”
Bast did a mental pivot and tried again. “There are other people involved.”
Eli’s mouth fell into a flat line. “You mean Wade?”
There it was. Eli’s great weakness. Not that he’d ever admit it. “Yes, and Becca and Jarrett. All of them. Anyone related to the original deal that freed you and Becca from CIA service.”
“You may have missed the big news, but Wade and I aren’t exactly on speaking terms.”
No, they were too busy being locked in a battle of wills. They’d lived together, slept together, in Wade’s apartment in Jarrett’s building for all those months. Then they broke up and the ground still shook over the fallout. “I’m aware.”
“Someone else will need to worry about him.” Eli’s expression didn’t change but pain flashed in his eyes.
Bast shook his head. “You’re not as hard to read as you think.”
“Meaning?”
Bast wanted to put Wade and Elijah in a room and let them work it out, but neither man would cede an inch. “I’ll ignore that question for now since you could probably kill me with a stapler if I gave you a truthful answer.”
“With my finger, actually.” Elijah blew out a long breath as he stared at the ceiling. When he met Bast’s gaze again, his mask of indifference was firmly back in place. “Maybe Jarrett could convince Becca and Wade to hang around the club and limit their activities to the building.”
“It might come to that. I just wanted you to know something big and pretty terrifying could be coming. Again.”
“Fair enough.” With a nod, Elijah stood up. No fanfare or questions about what to do next. He wasn’t the typical employee. He instinctively knew what was needed and willingly put in long hours to get there.
Bast waited until Eli’s hand hit the doorknob to exit the office. “Eli?”
He glanced over his shoulder. “Yeah?”
“I’m going to the club soon. You’re welcome to join me for dinner. Maybe we could give Jarrett a head’s-up while we’re there.” Bast made the food offer at least once a week. Matchmaking wasn’t his thing but if throwing Wade and Eli together worked to break through the impasse, Bast was all for it.
Eli’s
frown came back. “You’re eating this early?”
That was the problem with having a smart former undercover agent on the payroll. They saw through the bullshit to the agenda underneath.
“I need to drop something off.” And that was all Bast planned on sharing on that score. Life was convoluted enough without having to explain to Eli about wanting to have sex with his former lover’s baby sister. Yeah, their social circle was a bit too tight. “Yes or no, Eli?”
He shrugged. “If you’re paying, I’m in.”
“Happy to know you can be bought.”
Eli’s sly smile came and went again. “When I want to be.”
• • •
Kyra rushed around her studio apartment, first in bare feet then on her knees. Throwing one shoe over her shoulder, then another, she crawled along the slim strip of hardwood between the bed and the closet, ignoring the way the floor dug into her skin and searching for her weirdly comfortable spiky black heels.
First her missing stockings and now this. She only had so many work outfits for the club and what she had to wear on duty was pretty specific. Becca and Jarrett supplied the store account to get the right clothing and provided a credit card for the more personal parts of her required outfit each night, but the shoes were a carryover from her life before the club. Becca approved them, which worked for Kyra since they had these special cushy pads inside. Now she had to find them.
Last night she’d taken the pumps off at the club and put on her flats and . . . damn.
She sat back on her heels as she remembered dropping the bag in the parking lot. She let it go so she could grab onto Bast instead. She refused to question her priorities but this did cause a logistics problem.
Scrambling to her feet, she got up and slid the mirrored closet door open. She scanned the floor looking through the piles of shoes for something suitably sexy that she could stand in for hours on end. She didn’t have the opening shift at the club, but it was Friday, which meant she closed tonight. It also meant being on her feet until she thought they’d fall off.
She snapped up a pair of open-toe sling-backs she hadn’t work-tested yet. “I can’t worry about that now.”
She turned around to hunt for her backup stockings and plowed right into Gena McBride, her neighbor from across the hall. Gena stood almost six feet tall with short black hair in a bob and a skirt she dyed herself but looked like it could hang on the rack in any high-end store.
Kyra thought of her friend as this Amazonian goddess with an art degree. She’d been out of school for a year and earned enough freelancing to live in a matching studio in the building, only two blocks from the center of the George Washington University campus. No bad for the free-spirited, no-ties type.
Kyra didn’t have many female friends. Growing up with a father who made a living on the wrong side of the law and kept her insulated from all but his closest deputies messed with her bonding skills. Then there was the problem where she made what she thought was a great friend freshman year of undergrad who turned out to be a plant from her father, watching and reporting back to him from the life he did not approve of for her.
“I’m sorry but I’m late.” Kyra reached around Gena and tugged on the drawer, opening it just wide enough to slip out the unopened hosiery package.
“You’re making me dizzy.” Gena lifted her hands in the air and plunked down on the bed and out of the way. And since the apartment consisted of a bed, a double chair, a kitchenette and little else, being in the way was pretty easy if more than one person was involved.
Gena leaned back with her palms against the mattress. “Are you really not going to tell me what happened last night?”
Kyra ruthlessly valued her privacy but recently opened up to Gena. Five months of tiptoeing around a friendship could do that. They didn’t yet have a revolving-door policy, but close. Gena had a key and some idea about Kyra’s love life plans.
Kyra wrinkled up her nose as she debated how much to divulge now. She trusted Gena but this thing with Bast, whatever it was, was so new and not defined. Hell, it might not even get off the ground, but not for lack of trying on her part. “I got one step closer.”
“Really?” Gena’s mouth dropped open. “To this Sebastian guy?”
Not the biggest vote of confidence, but Kyra ignored that. “He goes by Bast.”
“One step meaning you kissed him or one step meaning you can accurately report on whether the rumors about him are true?”
Kyra stopped spinning around, looking for another gym bag, and stared at her friend. Kyra saw concern and something else lingering behind those big blue eyes. “Not you, too.”
“I own a computer and know how to use it.” Gena tapped her forehead as she talked. “You gave me his name a few weeks ago and I looked him up. Not like it was hard. The guy is all over the Internet. There are interviews with his wife.”
“Ex,” Kyra said, jumping in before Gena finished her sentence. “That’s an important distinction.”
“My point is, the guy is notorious.”
Taking an extra second she didn’t have, Kyra dropped the stuff weighing down her arms and sat down next to Gena. “How much do you think is real?”
“Is that your plan? To find out?”
That sounded like Bast talking. Kyra didn’t like the theory no matter who said it. “I’m not looking to be a chapter in the next book.”
“Then what do you want?” Gena reached over and picked up Kyra’s hand.
“Him. Every inch of him.”
The unconditional affection was one of the things Kyra loved about her friend. Her mother had died before Kyra hit elementary school and her father believed in ruling by intimidation, so openness was pretty foreign to her. Gena touched and hugged everyone. Something Kyra took a while to get used to and which still caused her to involuntarily tense at times.
Gena stilled. “Wait a second.”
Kyra’s fingers went numb from the force of Gena’s squeezing. “Uh, ow.”
“This is real?”
Kyra tugged her hand out of the vise grip and shook it to get the blood flowing again. “What’s wrong with you?”
“I thought this was some fancy crush. That you wanted to check him out because you were curious but he didn’t actually mean anything to you.” Gena got up and paced to the small chest of drawers across from the end of the bed.
Something weird happened in the last two seconds and Kyra wasn’t sure what. “Wrong.”
Gena looked at her hands then the floor. Everywhere but up. “Kyra, I . . .”
“Say it.”
“I’m worried about you.” Gena faced Kyra now. “This guy seems like the type who will have some fun then move on fast.”
So, that’s what friendly concern felt like. Kyra didn’t hate the sensation though Gena could work on her delivery a bit. “I hope not.”
“You’re thinking long term? God, Kyra. I had no idea this was more than a crush on a powerful guy you happened to know.”
When Gena continued to look as if she’d swallowed rotten fish, Kyra stood up and went to her. “Hey, you really are worried about me, aren’t you? Don’t be. I know the downside. I’ve thought this through.”
“Of course.”
Reality was she’d been taking care of herself for a long time. Wade had stepped up and rescued her from what would have been a rough life, likely pawned off on one of her dad’s underlings and running the streets looking for marks. Wade insisted on helping pay for college and she worked to save the rest, even taking time off to stockpile some cash. Wade’s only requirement was that she stay away from their father. Wade just had no idea how hard that was.
For the first time that she could remember, Kyra reached out and touched Gena’s shoulder. “Trust me. I have this under control.”
Gena’s pained expression didn’t ease. “Just be careful.”
FOUR
Bast put his briefcase down in the booth at his usual table and gave Elijah the okay to order whatever he wanted. Bast had one more piece of business before he could go in search of Kyra. He almost hoped she didn’t work tonight because being off meant more touching, and right now he couldn’t think of much else.
Then Becca motioned for him to meet her across the dining room. She leaned against the doorframe leading to the back office hallway. As usual in the club, she wore a sleek formfitting dress, this time dark blue. It hugged every curve and stopped right above her knee. The thing probably drove Jarrett to total distraction. Her brown hair flowed in waves over her breasts and that face had more than one man in the room risking Jarrett’s wrath to take a peek.
What none of the men here knew was her background as a CIA field agent. She’d been trained to infiltrate, and collect and decipher information. To do whatever she had to do to get the job done, including killing, which was one of her specialty areas. Next to Eli, she was the most dangerous person in the room, and that was saying something since high-ranking government officials with the president’s ear sat scattered around the room at private tables.
The Becca Bast knew preferred cargo pants and T-shirts to fancy dresses but she knew how to play the game and fit in. They’d had a rocky start since she once sent Jarrett to jail, and that shoved Bast’s trust of her past the breaking point, but he’d grown to like her. She stepped up and fought for Jarrett instead of leaving him about a month ago. She put his safety before her own, and Jarrett loved her so much he couldn’t see straight. That last reason was good enough for Bast to give her a second chance.
He slipped in next to her and surveyed the room. “I’m not used to the early crowd.”
“It’s almost seven.”
He winked at her. “Like I said, early.”
A smile lit up her face. “Thanks for stopping by on such short notice.”
She’d called as he left the office. Her request for a meeting worked perfectly for cover with his plans to track down Kyra. “I’d planned to eat here tonight anyway.”
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