Undercover with a SEAL

by Cindy Dees

  Asher heard a commotion at the front door and tensed—no doubt one or both of the drunks from before were trying to get back in—but the bouncer handled it and kept the troublemakers out. He released the tension from his body but wouldn’t go so far as to say he actually relaxed.

  His phone vibrated, signaling an incoming text, and he fished it out without ever taking his eyes off Hank. She moved around quickly and discreetly among the other patrons like she didn’t want to be seen. Not that he blamed her. Roaming hands seemed to be epidemic around this place.

  His jaw tightened a little more each time some bastard grabbed her ass and gave it a squeeze. When she made her way back to the bar to place an order and got a second’s respite from the groping, he spared a glance down at his phone.

  The text was from Perriman. Don’t come back until you’ve relaxed, Hollywood. That’s an order.

  Hollywood. His nickname on the team and a reference to his movie-star good looks. As he recalled, Perriman had been the first of his instructors to start calling him that back when he’d been a snot-nosed kid with a chip on his shoulder, hell-bent on showing his father that he was a bigger, badder dude than the old man had ever been.

  He silently cursed his boss in all of the many languages he spoke. Idly, Asher noted a patron ducking through a door at the back of the club. The passage was guarded by a beefy guy wearing a dress shirt and tie. The lap dance lounge must have been back there. Although as several more guys strolled into the back over the next few minutes and none returned to the bar, he began to suspect the patrons were going upstairs instead. Which meant this place was a front for a whorehouse.

  Was Hank a working girl?

  The idea didn’t even faze him, as it turned out. He had to find a way to get to know her better. Seduce her. Have a passionate affair—paid or otherwise.

  Except, he was on only a couple weeks’ leave. Just passing through. For all he knew, she was looking for a long-term relationship. Permanence. Commitment. He had no right to pursue her randomly. His gut clenched in frustration at the thought of letting her slip away.

  Speak of the devil. She was sauntering back toward him with a bottle of pretty decent whiskey and a shot glass balanced on her tray. She set both down in front of him and gave him a fleeting, secret little smile that only he could see.

  “What do I owe you?”

  She smiled again, a little bigger this time. Her whole being lit up when she smiled like that. Jeez, he couldn’t remember the last time a woman had knocked him this off balance. She murmured, “It’s on the house for helping break up the fight.”

  “Wow. Generous. Who’s the owner so I can say thanks?”

  Her eyes went furtive again, and she suddenly glanced toward the door beside the bar.

  His senses went on high alert. “Are you safe here, Hank?” he asked.

  A pregnant pause. Her doe-eyed gaze flickered to him and then skittered away again. “Yes. Of course.”

  Not safe. And there went his protective instincts, firing on all cylinders. “What time do you get off work tonight? I’ll walk you home.”

  Massive alarm fired off in her big, scared eyes. “No!” she blurted.

  “It’s nothing like that,” he explained quickly. “I’m just offering to see you home safely. I swear I won’t come on to you or anything. But after that fight, those drunks will hang around outside looking for trouble.” It was a lie, but he really did want only to protect her from the threat scaring her inside the bar. And she obviously wouldn’t let him walk her home without an excuse.

  “I can take care of myself,” she said.

  He frowned, studying her face closely. Lord, she was mesmerizing. He greedily memorized every nuance of her face. Then he asked bluntly, “Do you ever work upstairs?”

  Chapter 2

  Hank stared down at the big, intimidating man seated before her and answered forcefully, “No!” She ought to be offended by his far too personal question, but she got the distinct impression he wasn’t asking because he wanted to buy an hour’s use of her body.

  Not that she would necessarily say no to him if he offered. He was handsome with a capital H. Fashion magazine hot. He had that whole chiseled features thing going. Dark hair. Dark tan. And Lord, his light eyes looked right through her. She couldn’t tell in this light if they were gray or blue. A hint of pain clung to him, masked by his deep reserve. She never could resist a man with a dark past.

  Not just his big, athletic body, but his entire being, was perfectly still as he watched everything that went on around him. She got the feeling that his all-encompassing stare could turn predatory in a second. But so far, whenever he’d turned it on her, his eyes had lit up with something reminiscent of a volcanic eruption—hot and molten.

  If only she could tell him the truth. That her brother was lost somewhere inside the criminal organization that ran this place. That she was trying to infiltrate the Russian mob far enough to find him and save him from whatever he’d gotten mixed up in. Or at least to find out what had happened to him. That he was her big brother, and he’d practically raised her after the car accident.

  She turned her attention back to the man lurking in the shadows. She was a total sucker for brooding, dangerous men, and he was both in spades. She couldn’t get over how well his dark hair was set off by those light gunmetal eyes of his. And the way he’d handled himself in the bar fight left no doubt how deadly he really was. He’d waded through seasoned brawlers and armed mob muscle like they were school children.

  She spoke earnestly under her breath. “You seem like a decent guy. This isn’t the kind of place you should hang out in. Go have a nice life and don’t worry about me.” Find yourself a supermodel and have insanely great sex...

  He poured himself a healthy shot of whiskey from the open bottle she’d put in front of him. “Not how I roll.” How then, did he roll? God, she’d love to find out firsthand. Of course, any idiot could see he was severely out of her league. Men like him just didn’t want anything to do with cheap waitresses in sleazy joints like this.

  “I’m not everyone...Hank. Hankova is a feminine patronymic. What’s your actual first name?”

  She frowned. He knew how patronymics worked? Practically no American had ever heard of the universal Slavic custom of taking the father’s first name, adding an ending, and making it the child’s middle name. “It’s Evgeniya. My first name, that is.”

  He winced sympathetically, for which she might just have loved him a little, and then smiled ruefully. “I see now why you prefer Hank. It’s going to take a little getting used to, though.”

  He planned to stick around long enough to adjust to her weird name? Whoa. Cue the stunned happy dance. She smiled shyly. “My mother called me Eve.”

  “Eve. That’s nice.”

  Nice? Well, crap. There went any chance of him ever seeing her as a sexy femme fatale. The kind of woman he would consider having a torrid affair with. “I always thought it made me sound like an old lady.”

  “Well, then, Hank it is. But you’re still nice.”

  Frantic to dispel the nice image that went hand-in-hand with “girl next door” and “my best friend’s off-limits little sister,” she took a step closer to the table. Then she leaned down, planted her palm on the table beside the whiskey bottle and gave him a generous look down her shirt.

  Reaching for her toughest, most threatening tone of voice, the one she used to back off drunks who simply would not take no for an answer, she purred, “I’m a lot of things, mister, but nice isn’t one of them.”

  Lifting a brow, he leaned back in his seat and pinned her with an intent look. Well, that wasn’t exactly the response she’d been hoping for at all! She’d wanted heat. Interest. Acknowledgment that she was torrid-affair material. Instead, it felt like he was stripping her bare with that laser stare of his, analyzing her psyche with computer-like precision.

  She had to fight not to squirm under his probing gaze as the layers of her deception fell away. Drat and
double drat. He’d seen right through her ruse.

  At long last, analysis apparently complete, a wry smile curled up one corner of his mouth and he looked away from her, his gaze casually scanning the club. She sagged in relief and released the breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. Intense guy.

  He murmured mildly, “Put your claws away, kitten. I’m no threat to you.”

  Hah. He had no idea. She did not need any distractions. Nor did she need some high-profile guy coming in and making waves around her—the kind of waves that would attract undue attention in her direction. Her whole plan revolved around being invisible. Innocuous. Quietly sliding so deep inside the Russian mob outfit running this place that she could unearth the truth and maybe get some closure. Figure out whether Max was alive or dead—

  “Take this,” the man seated before her murmured. He passed her a business card.

  Disappointment coursed through her. Really? He was giving her his phone number to get a date? One word was written on the back. Asher. And a phone number.

  “Is that your first name or last?” she asked.

  “First. And my mother called me Ashe.”

  She couldn’t picture this hard-edged man ever having had a mother. Glancing back down at the card, she frowned. What was that area code? It wasn’t local. She turned the card over. It was for some sort of sporting goods and ammunition warehouse in Baton Rouge. “You sell tents and guns, Asher?” she asked drily.

  His voice was low, sexy as he murmured, “You can call me Ashe, too.”

  Cripes. Her toes curled in her high-heeled platform shoes as the masculine confidence in that low rumble vibrated through her belly.

  He was speaking again. “...only thing I had to write on. That’s my cell phone number on the back. You ever get into any trouble you can’t handle, call me. Okay?”

  She looked up from the scrawled number quickly. “You’re some kind of hired muscle?”

  The corner of his mouth curled up again. “Something like that. Keep it, eh? No strings attached if you call the number. Just a helping hand. You’re a good kid, and you’re clearly in over your head.”

  Oh, God. That was so nice of him. Something hot and sharp caught in her throat, choking her a little. She’d nearly forgotten what it was like to have a decent human being give a damn about her. An urge to take him up on his offer and confide everything to someone—anyone—nearly overcame her. Heck, the temptation just to have a simple, honest conversation was almost more than she could resist.

  But then her spine stiffened. Her work here was not done. She had to maintain her cover. Her life, and possibly her brother’s, depended on it. She was in too deep to back out now. A list of names, deals, dates and crimes she’d already procured was etched in her mind. There would be no leaving this quest until she succeeded...or died.

  Belatedly, she smiled cynically at Asher—Ashe—and spoke with utter sincerity. “Believe me. I’m not a kid. Not anymore.”

  “Take care of yourself, Evgeniya Hankova.” He pronounced her name exactly right, palatalized vowels and all, as if he was a native speaker of Russian.

  Her gaze snapped to his. Surely he wasn’t one of them! Had this been a test? Ohmigod. Had she said something to give away her real motives for being here? Frantically she reviewed their brief conversation while her face froze into a mask of a smile. She backed away from his table quickly, turned, and fled to the storeroom behind the bar to catch her breath.

  Vitaly, the owner and manager of the whole establishment, poked his head into the filthy little room far too soon. “I need you out front. Candy’s done with her set, and everyone wants drinks.”

  Great. Candy was one of the sexiest pole dancers in the entire club. She was also all of fifteen years old. The patrons would be horny and grabby after her performance. Steeling herself to ignore the lewd comments and inappropriately groping hands, she nodded at her boss and stepped back out into the bar.

  He was gone.

  She knew it without even having to glance over at the table in the corner. Ashe’s absence was a cold chill against her skin where there should have been warmth. She smiled down blankly at the mobster who’d just proposed vulgar sex with her in Russian she wasn’t supposed to understand. Take the drink order. Move on to the next table. Keep moving. Just keep moving...

  God. For a minute there, she remembered what life had been like before everything went to hell. A nice, normal guy treating her with a modicum of respect and concern. Was it possible to be homesick for America while standing on American soil? Apparently, yes, because she felt tears welling up in the backs of her eyes.

  Stop it. No feelings. No fear. She was a stone. She would have her answers, and then nothing else mattered.

  * * *

  The bar closed at 2:00 a.m., but Hank and the other waitresses were expected to stick around to clean up after that. The Voodoo was particularly trashed tonight because of the fight. The one Ashe had broken up with such ease. She yanked her thoughts away from the enigmatic American who had wandered so far from where he should have been and ended up in this little corner of hell. He was not for her. That whole normalcy thing was not for her, not anymore. She bent down to pick up the remains of a broken chair.

  The good news was she was not one of the trafficked, drug-addicted girls upstairs. She was still free to walk out of here and never come back if she chose to. At least for now.

  She could turn the crew in charge of this place in to the police. But a) she wasn’t entirely certain the police weren’t being paid to ignore the goings-on at the Who Do Voodoo, and b) then she would never find Max. Besides, she was convinced this place was a small fish in the overall crime ring running it.

  Her goal was to work her way up to the big sharks before she called the authorities. She had names and pictures of a few of the girls that she’d snuck on her cell phone over the past few months. Those would go to the police as soon as she concluded her own investigation.

  She even had pictures of a few men who came into the bar and disappeared quickly into the back any time they showed up. Vitaly was always surly when they left, and his complaints about how much money his bosses took out of the till always happened right after those silent strangers paid a visit.

  The bar was finally restored to a semblance of its usual squalor, and Vitaly growled at the waitresses to go on home. She took off her apron, hung it in the storeroom and slung her purse over her shoulder. Wearily she headed outside with the other girls. They traded good-nights and went their various ways. As for her, she trudged deeper into the bowels of the Warehouse District’s worst section.

  The darkness at this time of night was thick and impenetrable, shrouding her in heavy menace. Ever since the car accident, she’d been terrified of being alone in the dark. She walked fast and tried to project a badassery she was far from feeling as she hurried home. If she could call it a home. Her apartment was, at best, a dive. But it had a bed, a sofa, a tiny kitchen and a tinier bathroom. And she could afford it on her meager pay.

  She’d graduated from college the previous June with a degree in art history and restoration, just before Max went AWOL. She could probably land a decent job given her family connections in the art business, and there was the cash she’d inherited when her father had died. It had covered the cost of her college with enough left over to start her own art restoration business if she wanted. Instead, she was living in a slum as part of her cover and waiting tables in a cesspool while she searched for her brother.

  Her humble abode was on the second floor of a hundred-year-old building situated over an Oriental rug showroom. The rug merchant downstairs had stashed a girlfriend in the apartment until his wife caught him and forced him to ditch the mistress and rent the place out. Hank suspected the only reason she was allowed to be here was because the wife didn’t realize that Hank the Renter was a girl. A young, single, reasonably good-looking one at that. The rug merchant had made a few overtures to her to take up with him where the former tenant had left off
, but she’d turned him down firmly and nailed the door shut that led from her living room downstairs to the old lecher’s office.

  She turned into a puddle-strewn alley running alongside the rug store and started up the rickety wood stairs that led to her place. A sound behind her made her whip around, hand plunging into her purse to grip her can of pepper spray.

  A man-sized shadow rushed toward her from the alley entrance, and she froze. What to do? How to react? Hank’s heart lurched in her throat. She had to do something, but what? The back of the alley was a dead end. Nobody would hear her scream, and even if someone did hear her, no one in this neighborhood would call the police. Oh, God. She was in huge trouble.

  But as quickly as that thought rushed through her brain and panic crashed through her body, a second, taller shadow raced out of the darkness from behind the first one. The fight—if she could call it that—was quick and brutal. Shadow Number Two chopped her would-be assailant in the back of the head with a vicious backhand blow that dropped Shadow Number One like a brick.

  The violent second shadow took off running straight at her. Crap. The set of the big man’s shoulders was grim. Determined. She didn’t need to see his face to know she was his next target.

  She turned and raced up the stairs, half-sobbing in terror. She stumbled, grabbed the rail and hauled herself upright. Splinters from the aged and cracked wood railing stabbed her palm, but she ignored them. She was going to die if she didn’t get inside and behind a locked door now.

  Footsteps closed in too damned fast from behind. Oh, God. A half dozen steps to go. The stairs shook as the shadow’s weight crashed onto them. She fled across the tiny landing. Keys. Dammit. Where were her keys?

  She fumbled desperately in her purse as her attacker took the steps behind her in great leaps that devoured the long staircase all too fast.

  There. Her fingers found the jumble of keys. She snatched them out of her purse and found the familiar shape of her door key. Oh, God. He was almost on her. She whirled, threw her purse at him with all her strength and turned to unlock the door.