by Lexi Blake
She had something she had to do as well. “Can I use your room? I don’t want to tip off the Agency until I’ve made the call.”
Shane put a hand on her arm. “Of course you can. You know this is still your op. If you want to wait and see if we can talk Josh into being quiet. Maybe if the three of us…”
“No. Absolutely not. This is my op and I’ve put us all in danger. I’m not making another dumb play. I wish I could, but it’s only right.” She moved up the stairs, not looking back even though her whole soul ached when she heard Josh’s pained shout.
He was letting his body be tortured because she’d shredded his soul.
What had he meant when he’d said he would stay at Jared’s until he could find another place? She stepped into the house she’d come to love. She’d even started sneaking some color into it. He hadn’t said a thing when she’d bought some blue and yellow pillows for the stark white couches. He’d merely used them while they laid on it together watching a movie. And he’d smiled as she’d hung the dachshund surfing picture she’d gotten at a local surf shop. The place was filled with peace for her and she knew what it meant to Josh.
But she’d invaded his sanctum. Would he leave it now because it would be forever tainted? Had she cost him his very home?
She forced herself to walk even though every step felt leaden. At least this would cost her, too. She was about to pay the bill for what she’d done to Josh and then she would be free to do what she needed to. After the op was over, she would hunt down Morales and anyone else who could hurt him and end all those threats with as much blood and pain as possible. She would find his blackmailer and give him back his peace.
If it was the last thing she did…
Kayla moved into the room they’d taken to calling security central. It was the one place where they could talk without the Agency listening in.
It was time to remember she was a professional and not merely some ridiculous girl in love.
Because she’d just killed that girl, too.
Joshua Hunt was the love of her life and that feeling wouldn’t come around again. She would live out the rest of her days hollow on the inside because that essential piece of her would always be missing.
She picked up the phone, her hands trembling because she was about to lose another essential piece of herself.
“This is Knight,” the familiar voice said.
If he was pissed she’d woken him, she couldn’t hear it in his voice. Damon was steady as a rock. Damon would never be in this position. He would have figured another way out. He would have made this call a critical twenty minutes earlier. “It’s Kay, Damon.”
There was a momentary pause as though he’d heard something in her voice, and then his own softened. “Tell me what’s happened.”
“I fucked everything up.” The tears began again as she started the story that would end her career.
It didn’t matter. She’d ended everything important to her when she’d killed the light in Josh’s eyes. There was only the op left now.
And after that revenge.
Chapter Fifteen
An hour later, Kayla sat on the steps again, but the brutal sounds of Declan and Josh beating on each other had ground down to whispers and the occasional groan.
She felt like she’d aged on that step. Like she’d gone down to the beach one woman and come back someone older, harder than before.
Declan stepped out from the room at the base of the house, tugging his shirt over his head. She could easily see where Josh had gotten some good jabs in, but it appeared they’d both left each other’s faces alone. “Your boy’s pretty vicious. If I hadn’t been fairly quick, he would’ve pile drived my junk in there.”
A low laugh got cut off by a moan of obvious pain. “Fuck you, Burke. I wasn’t as fast. You got to teach me that move. After my balls inflate again. Hopefully they’ll do that.”
She gasped and stood up. “I told you not to hurt him.”
Declan held a hand up as though warding her off. “He needed that pain and I did as you asked. Look at this. His face is fucking perfect.”
“But my kidney is not,” Josh said, though he appeared slightly lighter than before. “I think I felt it go back there.”
“Do you need to go to the hospital?” Kay asked. He looked like hell despite the fact that no one had hit his face.
“No.” He stared through her. “I just need you to go away. I’ve agreed to keep Dec and Shane on until after the shoot. It’s too soon to find and train new guards. I’ll let the Agency send in someone else. Not you.”
He was willing to deal with everyone but her. Yeah, that made sense. Unfortunately, it couldn’t happen. “The Agency isn’t going to barter with you. They’ll still want me to go. If you think it’s too late to bring a couple of bodyguards up to speed, how do you think the Agency feels about their operative? Also, Morales is expecting me. I assume you’ve sent him my name as your companion.”
“I’ll tell him I got tired of banging you and found a younger model,” he said with a smirk.
Dec turned. “Hey, what was part of our deal?”
“I didn’t call her what I wanted to call her,” Josh said, his hand on his ribs.
Shane appeared, leaning against the doorjamb. “Just try to be civil, man. I told you she’s hurting, too.”
“We’ll have to agree to disagree on that,” Josh replied. “Now, if there’s nothing else, I’m going to take a long shower.”
“You can’t leave me behind, and I don’t think it’s a good idea to tell the Agency that you know what’s going on.” She had to be reasonable here. “If they know, it might occur to them to use what they know about you to ensure your silence. I have a better plan.”
“I’m sure you do. Can we talk about it over Scotch?” He started toward the stairs. “I know we can’t talk openly in my home, but at least we could do this in the secure room. Dec said you didn’t wire up that part of the house. Let’s hear this brilliant plan of yours.”
“I’m not the one who’s going to sell you. Tomorrow, someone from McKay-Taggart is coming out to set up a plan. He’ll explain what you get from us if you help. I think you’ll like the plan. It fixes most of what I screwed up.”
“Most?”
“I don’t think Big Tag can make you believe I love you, Josh.”
He rolled his eyes and started up the stairs. “Keep that shit to yourself. I don’t want to hear it.”
“I’m not going to not say it because you don’t want to hear it.” She followed him, a little afraid he might fall back. “If you’ll meet with my boss, I think you’ll find he can help you out. We can’t meet here. I’ve arranged a meeting at The Reef in the morning. Riley will have everything ready.”
He kept moving, not looking back at her. “Naturally your plant will have things ready in my club. It’s good. I can leave my resignation letter there.”
“Resignation? Why would you do that?”
“Because unlike you I have some personal honor. I let the wolves in. I didn’t know I was letting the wolves in, but they got in because of me. I won’t put people I care about in danger. They could lose their jobs, their privacy, and all because of me. I don’t know why I thought it would work in the first place.” He looked back at Dec and Shane. “You think I should hear what this guy has to say?”
Awesome. The guys had bonded and it looked like she was the one left out.
“Yes.” Shane didn’t hesitate. “If he’s coming here, then he’s serious and he’s got something to offer you. He’s not like the Agency.”
“But that means we’re playing this our way,” Dec said. “And it means the Agency can’t know that you know. They can’t know Kayla gave you classified information.”
“Ah,” Josh said with a sigh. “The company is protecting its own. That I understand. I can work with that. What you’re saying is we can’t talk about this upstairs and we have to pretend everything is normal. That’s going to be fun for me. All right. I�
�ll talk to this guy but only because I would like to get my fucking life back and I’m not a monster. I would have helped out if someone had asked. Hell, I would have done it just for the experience. I would have used it to play a spy somewhere down the line. I don’t like getting cast in roles I didn’t fucking audition for and ‘pathetic idiot who gets taken down by a warm pussy’ is the kind of role my agent tells me to turn down.”
“I was hot,” she corrected. “If you’re going to insult me at least get it right. I was the hottest pussy you’ve ever had, babe.”
“If you say so.” He turned and started back up the stairs.
“Kay, can you handle him tonight? Because I think maybe he’s still in a mood to tear you up,” Shane said. “We can make an excuse about you having to go see one of your dads or something.”
She shook her head even as she prayed Josh managed to make it up the stairs. He wobbled once, but held on to the railing.
He cursed and bent over. “I still feel that kick to my gut, asshole. If I do stay around, one of my demands is that you teach me how you move like that.”
“He can’t teach you what’s built into his DNA,” Shane replied. “No one moves like Dec. But we can both teach you a lot about how to fight. We’ll start daily training sessions when you’re ready.”
Without glancing back, Josh nodded. “I’ll look forward to it.”
He kept moving until he hit the landing and shuffled on.
She rounded on the bodyguards. “I do not understand men. He’s friends with you two now?”
Dec sent her a grim look. “I wouldn’t say friends, but he does need us. He gets that. He can’t go down there on his own. And quite frankly, he’s going to need someone to beat on for the next couple of weeks. It’s a male thing.”
“Is it? You think because I don’t have a dick I don’t want to punch something right now? Because you would be wrong.” She wanted to kill someone and his name was Tyler Williams. “What do we know about the DEA agent who busted our op?”
“We know he was a DEA agent. He passed our trace,” Shane explained. “You can’t go after the guy for doing his job.”
“He’s retired,” she pointed out, frustration welling.
“Yeah, well, I think we all have that case we would come out of retirement to deal with,” Dec continued. “I know I’ve got a couple. And the DEA guy has no idea the Agency’s got its nose up Morales’s butt. He’s trying to protect Josh the same way we are. When we get down to Mexico, I’ll see if I can talk to him, maybe get a feel for the guy.”
“I want to meet him.” She didn’t trust that this was coincidence.
Shane’s mouth turned down. “I don’t know that he’s going to change his mind about letting you go.”
“I’m the only one who can go. Any change at this point will likely make Morales suspicious. You could go with Josh, but you won’t have the same freedom I will. You’re a bodyguard. You’ll be expected to stay close to Josh. I can move around and get lost and act like a ditzy chick and no one will question it.”
“I get that, but Josh is angry and he’s not being reasonable,” Dec pointed out. “You need to get up there and make sure he doesn’t say anything that will bring the Agency down on all our heads. I assume we’re not calling Green or Fain to let them know we’ve told the target that he’s actually the target?”
“That could put Josh in a bad position,” Kay said. She’d thought of nothing but how to handle this since that terrible moment she’d blown the op wide open. “Right now I don’t know who all has listened to the tape from last night. Josh told me some things he wouldn’t want out in the world.”
“Riley’s listening in,” Shane replied. “The whole twenty-four seven listening thing takes up a lot of man hours. For some reason Green wants contractors on this one so Riley’s listening and summarizing for him every few days. Mostly Riley is listening for information about Hunt’s movements and to see if he mentions Morales at all.”
Then they might have a chance. “Call him and ask him to redact my conversation with Josh in the bedroom last night. He’ll know what I’m talking about. If that conversation ever got out in public…well, I think it simply makes Josh more heroic, but he would find it embarrassing. He’s spent years and millions of dollars to protect his past.”
“That bad, huh?” Shane asked.
“Nothing that was his fault. He’s overcome a lot,” she replied. “He deserves some peace. There’s something I didn’t tell him. I think Morales might be the man behind what was done to him as a child.”
Dec whistled. “Don’t tell him unless you want a half-cocked, walking bomb to go off down there. You’ve got to deal with that yourself. I don’t know how he would handle killing someone in cold blood. For some people that’s an edge you can’t come back from.”
She knew Josh had already killed, but that had been pure self-defense. This would be vengeance and it was different. That was her world and she didn’t want Josh tainted with her sins. It was the one gift she could still give him. “I’m going up to make sure he doesn’t do something stupid.”
She’d done enough of that for both of them. She should have regrouped and taken the problem to Damon, but she’d lost it. For the first time in years, she’d panicked.
“Hey, everything’s okay with base?” Shane asked.
It was a nice way of asking if the inevitable had happened. “Damon and Ian agree I need to be the one to go in. After that, Damon said we would have a very thorough debrief where I will likely be fired. My words, not his. I’m sure he’ll try to put me on probation or something, but I’m going to hand in my resignation at the end of this op.”
“That’s a little overdramatic,” Dec said. “Unless you have plans that you can’t follow through on while in the employ of a company with a good reputation. You going to take out Morales for Hunt?”
“I’m going to take out everyone I can find who ever hurt that man,” she vowed.
“Going after Morales alone is a suicide mission,” Shane argued.
“Yeah, I don’t think she cares about that right now.” Dec sighed. “Come on. Let’s go get Riley on the phone. We’ve still got time to turn this around, but we’ve got to keep the Agency out of it. No knock-down, drag-outs with your boy. If they get a hint of discord between the two of you, Green is likely to swoop down, and we can’t trust that Riley’s the only one who’s listening in. Green is a slippery sucker. I prefer Fain. At least he’s honest with his underlings. I get the feeling Green likes playing chess with us as his pawns.”
She watched as they walked upstairs and then followed. She walked into the home that seemed so perfect for her up until this point. Now she could practically hear the way silence invaded and filled up the space.
She walked up the stairs, hearing the shower going in the master. She turned the handle, surprised to find it unlocked.
Josh was standing in the middle of the room, stripped down to his boxers. She could already see the bruises and contusions from the session with Declan. Damn, idiot men.
“Let me look at those,” she insisted.
“Did I tell you you could touch me, sub?” His voice went hard.
She widened her eyes to silently question him.
“New play, baby,” he growled her way. “New protocols. You know I like to mix it up. Don’t touch me unless you’re given leave to. I think I might like some silence, too. Unless you’re going to safe word out on me. You always have that choice.”
Asshole. “So I don’t speak unless spoken to and I don’t touch you. Where would you like me? Would you like your sub to stay in her room until you’re ready to take her out and play with her?”
Maybe that was the best for both of them. There were only twelve hours before they met with Big Tag at The Reef. A cooling down period could do them both good. She could sit in her room and think about what happened to operatives who chose their targets over their missions. She could study up on Hector Morales. Yes, that would be good.
&nbs
p; “Get in the shower.”
She stopped and then remembered she wasn’t supposed to speak. She stared at him for a moment.
He dropped his boxers and tossed them aside. He was standing there in his full glory. The last few weeks had toned him further as he’d gone into training mode for his shoot. Every single muscle was defined and ripped. He looked lean and hungry, like he could eat up the world and still want more.
His anger was still there, simmering now, but he’d found another way he could burn it off. He could use her.
Her body softened, ready for some of that stress relief. She could do that. Her soul flinched at the thought of treating what had been even momentarily sacred as a transactional exchange of bodies.
“Did you not hear me, sub? I told you to get in the shower. Take off your clothes and get in the shower. Your Master fell while jogging and needs your help to get the freaking sand out of everywhere. But I shouldn’t have to explain what I need from you. I give you the order and you either follow it or choose to leave. I thought you understood D/s better than this.”
He was going to be a hardass to the end. He was standing there challenging her. What was more important, those cold eyes of his asked—her pride or the mission? Would she let him use her?
Pride was overrated and she won absolutely nothing if she got out of the game. Five minutes before she would have sworn Josh would never even look at her again. Now he was ordering her into the shower, commanding that she take her clothes off for him.
Was he doing it merely to humiliate her? That’s not what his cock was telling her. The man had taken a beatdown and his cock was twitching as he looked at her.
She pulled the T-shirt over her head. No bra for her so her breasts were immediately on display and that cock stopped twitching. His erection swelled, drawing his balls up tight against his body.
Not mere humiliation. He still wanted her. Oh, she had no doubt what was going through that male brain of his. He was telling himself he could still use her, probably should, that it would be foolish to not fuck the woman who’d betrayed him. Hell, she owed it to him.