Living with his sister wasn’t all that different from home, really. Because he was his father's only son, and therefore heir, he was given way more slack than Laurie. Still, it was way more convenient. Laurie lived alone and was gone most of the day, on work days, so he had a whole house to himself to do whatever he wanted. She made him food, cleaned up his mess for him, whether or not she wanted to. She was also gullible enough to buy everything he told her.
If not for all of that, he would have found some other place and moved. It was a problem that he didn’t have any money, but he could always do something for his friend to get some if he was that desperate. Or beg his dad… but the old man had been pissed when he realized Karl had hacked his computer, so he was staying clear of home for a while.
His dad would have to forgive him eventually, just like with all the other shit he'd done before. It wasn’t like he'd done anything that serious, after all.
Of course, thinking about Laurie led to complaining about Laurie. As convenient as sticking around her place was, the nagging was annoying. He wouldn’t have minded it so much if she hadn't been his sister, though.
"She has less of a stick up her ass than my old man, but she's almost as bad. She won't give me any cash, she won't even let me have her computer when she's out. The hell does she expect me to do when she leaves me alone? If I knew any girls to bring over, she would probably nag me about that, too."
"Does she give you any money?"
He shrugged. "No. Doesn’t mean I don’t get any. She leaves some in her room sometimes."
Karl had been careful to only take a little of it, so she wouldn’t stop leaving it there. It wasn’t really a lot, to begin with. There wasn’t anything he wanted, yet, because she bought and left snacks for him in the kitchen, too, but for the moment there was money there if he needed it. He was fine, anyway, for the time being, and he was pretty sure she would cave pretty easily if he fed her some bull and begged for some cash. Randy was letting him have his drugs for free for now, even if it wasn’t nearly as much as he'd like.
They jerked off to the video playing on high volume on the computer, smoke swirling around them. They'd done it in the same room a few times, with the rule that they kept their eyes on the screen. He groaned as he came in his hand and wiped down on his pants, fixing his fly.
"Man, I wish we could get some girls in here. It would make this place perfect."
There was a grunt, and then a chuckle beside him as Randy finished himself off. "Hey, how pretty is your sister?"
Karl looked over at Randy. "She's my sister, I don’t know. Why?"
"Well, you've mentioned her a couple times. She's older, right? Twenty-six?" Randy smiled. "I've never gone for an older woman before. She might be good for a fuck."
Karl snorted. "I don’t even know if she's into that. She's so freaking uptight, she probably doesn’t do guys."
"Like I care. I want to fuck her, not date her. Why don’t you introduce me to her?"
Yeah, Karl knew without thinking too much about it that it would be a bad idea. She might get mad if he brought his buddy home. But if he got her to relax a little…
Mickey, outside and listening to the whole thing, couldn’t help his anger. He wanted to cross the street, bust down the door, and beat up the two idiots. Karl would get the worst of it. He'd come across plenty of scum in his line of work, but people still surprised him.
But he couldn’t move. That wasn’t part of his job. He hated that he had to record all of this, and would have to send it to his superiors. He was forced to listen to Karl and his buddy, who he'd called Randy, not-so-casually talking about getting his sister drunk and then leaving Randy alone with her so he could have his fun. Mickey hadn't been lying to Laurie when he told her he didn’t have siblings, and right then, he was glad. If this had been his brother, he might have killed the kid off a long time ago and ended up on the wrong side of the law.
Mickey was absolutely disgusted with the entire conversation, even though he was pretty sure all they'd done at first was set up the porn and smoke weed. He'd heard some sounds that made him think they'd gotten themselves off before they brought Laurie into their conversation, and that only made him angrier.
More than that, he found himself feeling protective of Laurie. He was starting to believe she was innocent in this whole situation. Some stuff Karl had said made him almost sure, but he couldn’t just dismiss her from the investigation, his superiors would have to do that.
He was a little surprised at his reaction, especially the force of it, thinking about the fact that he hadn't felt that way about anyone since his ex. That was a situation that had ended so wrong, he'd been put off from interaction outside of work for a while. But then he quickly focused back on the conversation.
Mickey was there to work, not think about unrelated things. Laurie's fate from then on was dependent on him doing his job well.
Frustratingly, there was no mention of the illicitly copied documents and files coming up, though Karl did bitch at length about being thrown out by his 'stupid old man.' He mentioned Laurie a few more times, too.
Mickey didn’t have enough evidence to move in yet, but after he felt he'd spent way more than enough time there, he called in the location of Randy's safe house, Randy's name and a couple of surreptitiously taken photos, asking that Randy be monitored as well. He left whatever they were saying on record as he handled all that, and when he got back, it seemed like everything had quieted down inside. He'd need some permanent surveillance, but he would have to set it up later if he got the time. He didn’t bring the equipment for it.
He went home tired and found himself looking forward to coffee with Laurie tomorrow.
Chapter 7
That night, Laurie was on Skype with her best friend and confidante, Kizzy White. She, sadly, lived in Hawaii, so the only time Laurie got to talk to her face-to-face was when they both had the time for Skype. She was also a computer geek, specializing in writing telephone apps, and it was how they'd met. Kizzy was a little on the round side, with curly black hair, black eyes, and chubby cheeks, with a happy personality that Laurie just loved.
They hadn't had a chat in a while. With her brother now living with her, she found herself too preoccupied with other things, basically taking care of Karl, so that she barely found time for work once she got home. She'd taken to going to her office. She had one, not that she showed up there much because she could just as easily work from home. She'd probably shown up there more in the past two weeks than in the past several months.
But Laurie wasn’t on with Kizzy to speak about her brother. She knew he'd snuck out, which was why she was confident enough to make the call at all. Her brother had already invaded every other part of her life, she didn’t want him invading her conversations, too.
"So, what did you want to talk about?"
Even though she asked, the cheeky look on her face made Laurie think she'd guessed. Was her face that obvious?
It probably was. Now that she was on her own in the house, she felt like she could think about herself for a change, rather than worry about what her brother was up to. He'd show up eventually, likely by the next day.
That left Mickey.
"I have a new neighbor," she confided, a wide grin on her face. "This hunk who just moved in next door. Man, I wish you could see him. I've never met anyone that looked so perfect."
Her friend smiled knowingly at her. "So, you're finally realizing that people exist outside of your computer?"
"Oh, please, you're almost as bad as me, aren’t you?"
Kizzy snorted, grabbing a cup from outside the screen and taking a sip from her straw. "Maybe, but I at least get out of my room and don’t stare at my computer all day."
Neither did she. The bike wasn’t just there for decoration. She made sure to go out at least once every week for an hour or so, just riding her bike.
But, considering how things had been recently, her mood couldn’t help but sour.
"I'v
e actually been getting out a lot more recently. Or I wouldn’t have been there to see my new neighbor move in when he did. My brother," she said in explanation to Kizzy's curious look.
"That's right. You told me he was staying with you. How's that going?"
Laurie sighed, her good mood short-lived. Well, she couldn’t think about any one thing without her brother butting in, lately. How could she answer the question, though? The truth would just have her ranting, and a lie would get caught by her friend, even over Skype.
"It's not just that he's staying here. He showed up on my doorstep with a backpack, because my dad threw him out of the house and he had nowhere else to go."
Kizzy, reacting to the anger in her voice, adopted a serious look, putting the cup aside as she leaned closer to the screen. "Did he tell you why?"
"If you're asking about my brother, he said he told my dad he was bisexual. I haven't actually talked to my dad. I'm not even sure I want to, and Karl insisted he didn’t want to talk about him either."
"Would he really chase your brother out for something like that?"
Laurie snorted. "Oh, I believe it. I don’t know what my brother was thinking of, telling him that kind of thing." Or maybe he'd been as stupid as she'd seen him acting recently and did something obvious to clue their father in. "He's a bit of an idiot, but he should have been able to tell he wouldn’t take it well. The man is a sexist, of course, he'd be against something like this."
Kizzy didn’t ask for clarification. Once they became friends, it hadn't taken Laurie long to tell her friend all about her life at home. Her dad had treated her unfairly. She was the oldest, but because she was a girl, he'd decided practically the day Karl was born that he was going to be the one to inherit most of his assets, and Laurie would get what was left for herself and her children. He'd been planning her family before she was even in her teens.
Because of his views, he'd been a lot less strict with Karl as they grew up. Laurie had never said anything, but spoiling him while still keeping him in shackles was probably what threw her brother into his rebellious phase in the first place. It hadn't changed since he was a preteen. If anything, it had gotten worse. She wasn’t allowed to tell her brother what to do, so even if she'd stuck around at home, she was pretty sure she wouldn’t have been of any help.
Also, because she was a girl, she'd had to rely on scholarships to go to college. Her dad hadn't seen a reason why she needed anything above a few community college classes, he didn’t understand her interest in computers or technology at all, so he wouldn’t pay her college tuition. Karl, on the other hand, got a free ride to college. Her dad had called her up, ranting when he refused to go at all, but it wasn’t like she could have changed her brother's mind.
Worst of all, she was angry with her father because he was sexist, yet somehow still got angry when she didn’t even consider joining the military. She wasn’t good for much besides being a homemaker, so she didn’t even need higher education, but she would be good enough to serve her country. Laurie was pretty sure he didn’t even realize how hypocritical his views were.
Aside from her problems with her father, there were her problems with and worries about Karl.
"I really don’t know what to do with my brother, though. He still acts like a young teen with no sense despite being past twenty. I mean, I definitely believed him when he told me, but…" she chewed on her lip, feeling conflicted. "I'm worried there might be more to the story of why Dad threw him out besides his claiming he came out as bisexual. It's just so out of the blue and sounds more like one of Karl's weird obfuscations than anything real. I know I didn’t keep in touch like I should have, as often as I should have, but I did go home at least once a month before I got so busy with school and other stuff."
She wouldn’t be suspecting her brother, but how he'd been acting, and the things Mickey had asked about him made her think too much. She pictured her brother through the eyes of an outsider, and he didn’t exactly inspire a good image. Of course, Mickey would have been worried if Karl was just someone he bumped into out of nowhere.
"It was drugs, wasn’t it?" Kizzy theorized.
"That sounds like Karl," Laurie said silently. And it made more sense than her brother playing the victim.
She'd have to look into this some more. If there was more to the story, she would try to get Karl to tell her what he wasn’t telling her. She would only resort to calling their father if he refused to cooperate at all.
Outside, listening with his mic and watching through the window using his camera zoom, Mickey sighed with relief.
Laurie was smart. She would need that. He could only hope that she would figure her brother out soon, especially if he decided to try out what he'd been discussing with his friend before. But mostly, Mickey sighed with relief because he was now certain that Laurie, despite her computer skills, was in no way involved in espionage. Then he grinned.
He also rather liked that she called him a hunk.
Chapter 8
Early the next morning, Mickey checked in via his secure uplink with Madeleine.
"That's the end of my report. It's about all I have so far, but when I get more information, I'll call you as soon as I can."
He'd already sent the two separate recordings he'd gotten from the Nash siblings. He would have loved to edit Karl and Randy's, but he didn’t dare. He wasn’t so good that he could make whatever edits he made untraceable, and then he'd be stuck with the responsibility to answer as to why he would do it in the first place.
He would just have to get some more info on the other kid, and someone else could monitor him, so he wouldn’t have to worry about it for a while.
"Of course. Good work, Agent Harding."
He almost rolled his eyes. Well, at least she was pleased.
Madeleine Tate, forty-two years old, was his contact and superior and had been with him on missions for the last few years. Still, in all that time, she'd never called him by his first name. Mostly, she was just a voice on the phone for him; she almost never left Washington DC. He had met her briefly when he was first assigned to her, so he at least knew what she looked like. On the short side and blocky, with a long face, small, bright green eyes, and shoulder-length, graying blonde hair.
Madeleine was a bit of a battle-axe, hard-nosed and a stickler for proper procedure. Mickey tolerated her for her mixture of fairness, attentiveness to her agents, and general intellect. Cool, smart, articulate, and just a touch paranoid, with an obsession for precision and detail. That last bit was why he was so glad she was pleased with his report, it meant he was doing something right. If he'd done something that translated to a huge oversight to her, all he'd have received was cold silence over the line.
She also never let on about her personal life outside of a love for classical music, and he'd given up having her call him Mickey a while back.
"There is one thing, though," she continued, and the smile dropped from his face. "I am unable to provide surveillance for Randy thanks to the lack of personnel. If you really think he should be monitored, I will continue working on it, but the resources simply don’t exist right now."
Mickey wanted to curse. He didn’t like the idea of that kid being left to do whatever he wanted. Mickey was there, so he would know if anyone shady got close to Laurie, but it wasn’t his job to follow her everywhere, just her brother. He couldn’t always be with her.
His lips tightened. "I really believe there should be someone on him." Not just for Laurie's sake, but he couldn’t deny their last conversation was a large part of why he was being so insistent on this. "But if nothing can be done, I'll think up something on my end."
"Good. Now, your next order. Find a way into the Nash’s house and place some spy equipment. you don’t need cameras if it's too troublesome, but at least some microphones so we can listen in. Get on it as soon as possible. I'm sending over a stingray cell phone signal tracker so you can listen in on any cellular calls that your subjects make."
Dammit. It was too soon. They'd only just met yesterday, she was supposed to be in his house in the afternoon. After yesterday, he didn't want to arouse any more suspicion, but he'd have to find a way to get her to invite him to her place so they could have their coffee date there. At least he was relatively sure her brother wasn’t back yet from his visit to his friend's place. With any luck, he'd stay away longer so Mickey could come up with some sort of plan. It would be so much easier to handle if there was just Laurie there.
"I warn you right now, Agent. Just because Laurie Nash is not involved now does not mean that Randy and Karl won't try to rope her in later. Do not write her off as a suspect, no matter how innocent she seems."
He bit his tongue at the refusal that wanted to leave his mouth instantly. He wanted to argue for Laurie's case, provide every bit of evidence he'd been able to gather. Because it was a question of her character, he didn’t need physical proof. He wanted to convince them, or at least Madeleine, that Laurie was truly innocent.
But he didn’t, no matter how much he wanted to. She was still his superior, so he couldn’t just talk back to her. Besides, betraying that he felt anything other than clearheaded about this case might just get him booted from it and someone else to replace him. It was the last thing he wanted.
"Of course, ma'am," he said, perhaps a tad more stiffly than he usually would.
If Madeleine noticed, she didn’t mention anything. A few more words were exchanged before she declared their conversation over.
When they signed off, Mickey realized he had a lot of faith that Laurie wouldn’t be tricked into betraying her country that easily. She was already at odds with her brother. Clearly, she knew he was bad news; the only reason she was still helping him was probably because of their shared blood that neither could run away from. He'd keep an eye on her anyway, because of orders, but he felt sure in his assessment.
Deadly Seduction (Romantic Secret Agents Series Book 2) Page 4