He grabbed it and lowered it to the table. He didn’t really have an explanation for why he didn’t let go or why his fingers linked with hers. But his focus stayed locked on Walker. “So you’re saying you two aren’t working together?”
Walker’s gaze bounced to the joined hands, then back up again. “She’s not with the FBI anymore.”
“Since when?”
She slid her hand out from under Callen’s. “I’m still right here.”
“A year ago. I don’t know the damn date.” Walker balanced on his elbows and leaned in. “Why do you get to ask all the questions?”
“A year ago? How is that possible?” Callen ran the math in his head. The timing didn’t work. That would mean she really was doing research for television shows and her book.
It would also mean he’d been a pretty big asshole in refusing to talk to her and listen.
She smacked her lips together. “I tried to tell you that.”
No; it was all too convenient. Their stories parroted each other, but they could have been rehearsed. Walker’s expression of steely reserve didn’t give anything away. Grace looked ready to bang their heads together. Nothing new there.
Still, Callen couldn’t shake the feeling he was being played. “I don’t buy it.”
“I. Don’t. Care.” Walker said each word as a sentence, putting space between them and letting the tables around them hang on each beat.
The waitress appeared out of nowhere and slid a coffee mug in front of Walker and waters in front of Callen and Grace. “What can I get you two?”
“We need a few minutes,” Grace said. “And maybe a babysitter.”
Callen could barely wait until the waitress walked away to launch into a second round of questions. Right as he was about to, Grace jumped in. “Why are you in town, Walker?”
Some of the anger seeped out of the FBI agent’s stern features when he looked at Grace. “I am not talking to you with him here.”
“It’s hard to make things up about me when I’m sitting in front of you, isn’t it?” Callen knew that shot was juvenile, but control kept slipping out of his grasp, and the desperation kicking in his gut had him looking for any way to score a mental point.
Walker had the nerve to nod. “Your criminal record speaks for itself.”
Callen zipped right past pissed off to whatever emotion came next . . . homicidal, maybe. “You mean my non-existent record.”
“Again, stop. Both of you.” Grace’s hand shot out and she clipped her glass. It bobbled, but she caught it before it tipped. “Walker, you know Callen is telling the truth about that. He doesn’t have a record.”
Nice of her to stick up for him, though why she bothered was a mystery. “Exactly.”
“And you, Callen.” She picked up the glass and put it down with a smack a few inches out of hitting range. “Stop antagonizing the guy with the gun. Be smarter than that.”
He glanced at Walker and in that moment sensed the other man itched for a reason to draw. Maybe she had a point. “That’s probably not bad advice.”
Walker frowned at her. “Did you really come here, to this nowhere town, to be with him?”
“No.” Callen was sure of that much.
“Yes, I did,” she said at the same time.
Walker scoffed. “That clears things up.”
“It’s my life and I know what I did.” She glared at Callen. “Coming here was solely to find you.”
Walker wrapped his hand around his mug. “You took him back after he threw a fit and walked out?”
Callen was getting a little sick and tired of that interpretation. It ignored what really happened and made him look like a total ass, which he guessed was the point. “And there is no way I’m having this conversation with you here.”
“You’re both driving me insane,” she said as she looked around the diner.
Walker leaned in closer, keeping his gaze centered on Callen. “That means you should go.”
“And leave you two alone to plan and scheme? No way.”
She grabbed his arm. Dug her fingernails right into the shirt until she hit skin. “Honestly, Callen. Enough.”
He couldn’t figure out how to slip his arm out from under hers without hurting her, so he kept it there. Let her nails bite into him. “I’m just trying to figure out what Walker is setting me up for now.”
He shrugged. “It’s about time you pay for your crimes.”
Callen was about to respond when Grace let go of him. Sick freak that he was, he missed the contact even if it was a bit violent for his liking.
“Okay. You guys win.” She stood up and picked her bag up off the floor. “Since you two seem to want to fight, you can do it without me.”
Callen caught the edge of her shirt before she could turn and race off. “Where are you going?”
The question came out rougher than he intended, but she didn’t flinch. “Wherever you two aren’t.”
“I have questions for you,” Walker said.
She tugged her shirt free from Callen’s grasp and nodded in his direction. “You two seem determined to talk right over me. Fine. You can talk to each other for a change.”
Then she was gone. She walked past the staring diners. Said hello and kept going until she pushed the door hard enough to make the jingling bells hooked to the top fall off and clang against the tile floor.
The whole exit took about five seconds. Perfectly timed and executed. Callen had to give her credit for making a scene and looking like the victor, which she was this time and most others. While she acted like a grown-up, he beat back the anger and frustration festering inside him. Or he tried. Tried and failed.
“Smooth.”
Walker’s voice brought Callen back to the problem in front of him. “I’ve made her angrier before.”
And that was the sad truth. She had a low tolerance for stupid, and at the beginning of their relationship—if he could even call it that—he would do shit like take an extra work shift and not call to tell her he wouldn’t be home. He’d drink too much. Drink when he said he wouldn’t.
“Then congratulations on being a dick.”
Unfortunately, that wasn’t news. He’d wallowed in that state for a long time. Grace helped him break out of it, and then that fell apart, too. “Believe it or not, I don’t care what you think about me.”
Walker pushed his mug to the side and got in close enough for his harsh whisper to carry but not far. “Don’t fuck with her.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me.”
Once again he got cast in the role of villain. Callen understood the act Walker had going here, but why play it now when it was just the two of them? People leaned in too close and watched without trying to hide it, but there was no real audience to be impressed with his big FBI role right now.
“You sic her on me and then—”
“What?” Walker sat back against the booth hard enough that the man behind him turned around.
“Be a man and stop hiding behind her.” That was what pissed Callen off the most about Walker. Well, one of the things.
Callen had made a load of mistakes in his lifetime, but he owned them. He tried to make amends and fix what he could. Walker, the guy with the badge and the big office, didn’t do his own dirty work. No, he used Grace for that.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Walker asked.
The confused expression and tone were nice touches. Callen refused to buy in. “Why are you in Sweetwater?”
“To prove you are just like your dad.”
There it was. Walker unknowingly drilled down and hit Callen’s greatest fear. There was only one way to handle someone who got that close to the horrible truth—evade. “You’re an idiot.”
Walker shrugged. “You asked.”
“Fine. Why is s
he here?”
“I have no idea. I didn’t know she was until I walked into Mallory’s store this afternoon.”
He sounded sincere. The shock and the frowns. Callen tried to hold on to the idea that this guy was trained. That he fooled people for a living. Went undercover and played a part. That had to be what he was doing now.
“I’m supposed to believe you?” Callen asked.
“Again, I don’t give a damn what you believe. I just want to make sure you stop screwing with her.”
“So you can?”
“You are two seconds away from getting punched.” The menace in Walker’s voice sounded pretty damn real.
Callen had to admit that the delivery suggested more of a brotherly feeling for Grace than sounding like something a lover would say. If Walker was in love with Grace, he sure did a good job of hiding it.
Maybe there was another explanation—one still foreign to Callen, who never stayed anywhere long enough to earn a pension. “Aren’t you worried you’ll lose your precious job?”
Walker shook his head. “What the hell does she see in you?”
With each sentence Callen lost ground. He felt the dirt shift and all the anger he’d been so invested in collecting and piling inside him slip away. But he gave it one more shot. “Maybe she’ll get a bonus at work if she brings me in before you do.”
“Again, genius. She doesn’t work for the FBI anymore.” Walker talked slow, as if he were explaining something really difficult to a third grader.
“So I’ve heard.”
“She hasn’t for a long time, since before you started sniffing around her.”
“Were you watching us together back then?” The thought scraped against the inside of Callen’s brain, blocking out every good memory.
He wanted to believe some piece of his relationship with Grace was real. Hell, any piece of it. He needed that for his sanity, to know he hadn’t totally lost his ability to read a situation and people. To make him fell less like one of Charlie’s victims and more in control.
“If I’d known she was getting tied up with you I would have stopped her. By the time I figured it out, it was too late.” Walker glanced around the diner, but it didn’t appear as if he focused on anything. “You were already together, and she made it clear you were off-limits.”
“You think I believe that?” Damn, he wanted to and Callen hated that weakness.
“Not a news flash, but I still don’t care what you believe.” Walker waited while the waitress served food to the table behind theirs. “Look, you messed up with Grace, and I say good because you’re a fucking mess. Now do the decent thing and stay away from her.”
“She came to Sweetwater. She came after me.” And Callen still didn’t get that part. If it was all part of a ploy for information or to get closer to Charlie’s schemes or whatever, those days were over. They ended when he figured out her connection to Walker.
But that didn’t fit either. Why continue? Why uproot her life and come here to stay in a motel in the middle of Oregon? Her decisions didn’t make sense. They pointed to her being truthful, and Callen would not let that hope take hold.
“Dumb move for a bright woman.” Walker shook his head. “Not something Grace ever is.”
Because he couldn’t handle one more second of talking about Grace or the mix of anger and frustration and need that coursed through him when he even thought her name, Callen changed topics. “Speaking of women.”
Walker immediately switched to alert mode. His body stiffened and he sat there as if waiting for a body blow. “What?”
“Mallory.”
Walker started shaking his head before Callen finished saying her name. “Say one thing about her and I’ll pull my gun.”
That sentiment Callen recognized. He also noticed the fire in Walker’s eyes and the way his hands clenched into fists. This was protective mode. Callen experienced it himself. He’d seen that possessive, heated look in the mirror when thinking about Grace, as recently as this morning.
His mouth dropped open and he struggled to close it. “Holy shit, you’re sleeping with her.”
“There is nothing sexual between me and Grace.”
“Mallory, I mean.”
A nerve ticked in Walker’s jaw. Probably had something to do with how he tightened it until the point of snapping. “You have ten seconds to leave this booth.”
“Oh, I’m going.” Callen had found a weakness in his opponent. Not that he’d use it, but it was good to know he wasn’t the only one who could be set back on his heels by a strong woman.
“Stop smiling,” Walker said in a low angry voice.
Callen slid out and stood next to the table. “Do you have any idea what Leah is going to do to you if you mess with Mallory?”
“I can handle Leah Baron. And my personal life is not your business.”
Callen almost felt sorry for the poor bastard. Almost. “Oh, man, do you have a rough road ahead of you.”
“You threatening me?” Walker seemed to welcome the idea.
Yeah, no way was Callen letting the guy off that easily. “No, but I am looking forward to seeing you squirm.”
“Never going to happen.”
Spoken like a man who didn’t appreciate the strength and stamina of a woman like Mallory and her unbreakable friendship with Leah. Callen no longer made that mistake. “We’ll see.”
Chapter Eight
Grace leaned against her car and watched the argument play out through the diner window. She knew she should leave. Let the men do their testosterone dance and make complete idiots out of themselves from a safe distance. But she couldn’t pull away.
Watching let her take a good long look at Callen. Despite the bullheadedness and all the conclusion-jumping, she loved him. He could be thick and unyielding. He could also be fierce in his loyalty and so loving in the way he touched her.
Deep down he was broken, only a little—but he believed the break was irreparable. She’d read all about Charlie and in the months since Callen walked away had heard all about Walker’s theories. Truth was, every FBI agent in the world could pile on information implicating Callen and she wouldn’t believe it. She knew the real man.
And right now the man walked out of the diner with an unexpected smile on his face. That amusement made her want to rush inside and check for blood on the floor.
She straightened away from the car as he approached. “You have fun in there?”
He stopped right in front of her. “Walker really is sleeping with Mallory.”
Of all the things Grace thought he’d say, that was not on the list. “That’s what you guys talked about?”
Something had changed Callen’s mood. Instead of looking ten seconds away from driving her to the town limits and dumping her there behind a fence to keep her out, he struck her as being relaxed. Fury no longer vibrated off him. He appeared guarded, and his words remained cautious, but not closed off to the point of being shut down.
“First he supported your story about not setting me up.”
Now that was closer to what she expected Callen to say. “Let me guess—you don’t believe him either.”
“You can see where I might have a trust issue with you, right?”
More like a stubbornness issue. “Maybe if you listened for two seconds.”
“I’m listening.”
It took her brain a second to catch up with the conversation. She glanced around at the people going in and out of stores and the diner. Sweetwater was a small place, but people gathered in the middle of town. Or for some reason they seemed to do that whenever she stood outside.
Crowd or no, he couldn’t possibly mean what she thought he meant. “You mean now?”
“Sure.”
Leave it to Callen to pick up a shockingly bad sense of timing during their months apart. “In the middle of the
sidewalk in downtown Sweetwater?”
He swept an arm across the landscape. “Let’s not make the place sound like a big city.”
But it was outside, and people talked. He’d just served up enough for the rumor mill by talking with the FBI agent where everyone could see and hear. “That’s my point. For a man who values privacy, you sure seem to want to hash this out in front of a lot of people watching.”
“No one is—” Callen shifted and almost ran into two forty-somethings hovering behind him. After an apology, he turned back to Grace. “Okay, good point.”
“I think what you really want is to tweak Walker.” She pointed over his shoulder to the man inside the diner currently scowling at them as he held his mug with enough force to shatter it.
Callen didn’t appear all that impressed by the badge, the gun or the rage. “Because he has a thing for you and doesn’t want us talking?”
Not this again. “Walker doesn’t have a thing for me.”
“You sure?”
She wanted to shove against Callen’s chest. If Chief Darber weren’t walking inside the diner right at that second, she might have. “Stop being a moron.”
“A moron?” Callen said something under his breath about name-calling. “Exactly how long were you with Mallory? Sounds like you picked up some of her more annoying tendencies. Namecalling being my least favorite.”
“Long enough to know your problem is not just with me. It’s with everyone.” Though, to be fair, she’d already known that. He treated her well, always charming even through his gruffness. But he tended to ignore other people. She’d introduced him to a neighbor, and while he wasn’t rude, he wasn’t exactly full of sunshine either.
Callen defined loner. He stuck to himself and limited his activities away from home to work. He didn’t go out with the guys. Something about that dark part of his personality appealed to her. She never viewed herself as the rescue-him type, but sometimes she thought about Callen and wondered if she really was.
“I don’t have a female problem.” He sounded serious at first, then made a face like he wasn’t sure what he just said.
She tried to hold on to the frustration bubbling inside of her, but she couldn’t. She heard him say the words female problem and her mind zipped somewhere else and the laughter spilled out of her. “Do you want to rephrase that?”
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