Although they were identical in appearance, Megan was very different to Claire in other ways. Claire had everything she’d ever wanted out of life. She had the career of her dreams as a local kindergarten teacher. She had a Neanderthal who adored her and kissed the ground she walked on and she had a baby on the way. Home, family, that’s what Claire had dreamed of her whole life. And Megan would be the first to make sure her sister’s perfect life was never damaged. Claire deserved to have everything she dreamed of. But Megan was different, she’d never known what she wanted out of life. She’d tried lots of different careers and none of them fit. There was always a restlessness inside her, driving her to find something, and until she signed up to be part of Benson Security she’d never felt at peace. Now she did. She was where she was meant to be. And she was worried she was the only person who saw it.
“Maybe I should go get some experience?” A few years wasn’t so long to wait to become a proper part of the team. She could do a few years. “I could join the army, or the police.”
“You’d hate the uniforms. Polyester.” Claire made a shuddering sound. “Not to mention the early mornings. And the taking orders. You’re rubbish at taking orders…”
“Okay. I get it. You can stop now.”
“Look, just prove to be indispensable and everything will be fine. You can do it. I believe in you.” And she did. Megan heard it in every single word that came out of her sister’s mouth.
“I miss you, sis.” She blinked back tears.
“Me too!” Claire’s hormones got the better of her and she started to sob.
There was a shuffling noise, then Grunt came on the line. “Don’t make her cry,” was the order, before the phone was handed back to Claire.
“He’s very protective,” Claire explained unnecessarily.
“Yep, in a totally insane, I-own-you sort of way.”
As usual, Claire thought the criticism was funny.
“As for the important part of your confession.” Claire lowered her voice. “So you kissed Dimitri. What was it like?”
“Claire!” came the roar from her husband.
“Oh baby,” Claire said away from the phone. “You don’t need to get jealous. You know the only man I see is you.”
“I think I’m going to puke,” Megan said.
“I’m back. He’s gone to make me some hot chocolate. Now, spill. How was it?” The sound of Claire settling in for some gossip, and her delight in sharing it, made Megan ache for home. This was the longest she’d ever been away from her twin and it still didn’t feel natural.
“It was hot,” Megan confessed. “We were arguing. He was doing that arrogant ‘I know everything’ thing he does. And I got so mad with him that all I wanted to do was show him he wasn’t in control of everything.”
“So you kissed him?”
“It seemed like a really good idea at the time.” To be honest, it still seemed like a really good idea. “The man can kiss. He does this thing with his tongue…”
“No!” Grunt roared. “Claire doesn’t need to know about other men’s tongues. Why can’t the two of you talk about something normal? Like football?”
“Claire! Speaker again?!”
“Sorry. Knitting.” There was a click and she was back off speaker phone. “We’re private again.”
“Are you going to go off and knit again?” Seriously, if she was in Invertary she’d smack her twin upside her head. Pregnant or not.
“I’ll resist the lure of the wool,” Claire promised, sounding like one of the retired women from the town’s knitting club.
Megan shook her head. Her twin was a mystery sometimes. “I can’t kiss him again,” she said, more to herself than to her sister. “It complicated things. He’s hurting over his sister and he needs to focus on the mission. We both need to focus on the mission. It was a dumb thing to do.” Because now she’d had a taste of him, she wasn’t sure she could resist another one.
“Or,” her evil half said, “you could just burn up the sheets and get it out of your system.”
“You are not a good influence on me.” Megan smiled at the joke. Neither one of them had ever been known for their good behaviour.
“That’s why you love me,” Claire sang and Megan laughed away some of the tension that had been building throughout the day.
“If you kiss a woman and she tells you it’s nice,” Dimitri said to Joe as they sat in Callum’s office. “It’s a bad thing, right?”
“Who’d you kiss?” Joe had his ankles crossed and his feet propped on the edge of Callum’s desk.
“Who do you think?” With a question like that, Dimitri was seriously rethinking asking Joe for advice.
“Twin Two.” Joe grinned. “You’re nuts, you realise that. The woman is certifiable.”
Callum smacked his pen down on his desk. “This is exactly why I didn’t want to be part of this business. I saw Lake and his guys sitting around in Scotland, gossiping like a bunch of women and knew it was contagious. What’s next? Installing a day spa in the basement?”
Joe laughed at the man. “Haven’t you ever talked about women?”
“Never.” Callum frowned at them.
Joe pointed at him. “Maybe that’s why you’re still single. Maybe if you’d shared some tips with the guys you’d have been able to keep hold of a woman.”
Callum looked outraged. “You two are single. Why the hell would I take advice from you?”
“Hey.” Joe held up his hands. “I’m in my early thirties, you’re hitting forty. That’s midlife. I’ve got plenty of time to settle down. You wait much longer and you’ll be past it.”
For a minute it looked like Callum might punch something, possibly Joe.
“About the kiss.” Dimitri needed input. The woman was in his head every minute of every day and he was losing his mind over it. Nothing she did made sense. Nothing.
“Nice means you’re crap,” Callum snapped. “End of discussion. Now how about we plan this meeting with Abramovich? Or do you two need to go pull on your big girl panties to help you focus?”
Dimitri glared at the man, while Joe shot him a far more obvious hand gesture.
“Now,” Callum said as he stood and pointed at the blown up aerial photo of Rudi’s house. “I think we need to position a sniper here, and here.”
“Who you thinking?” Joe said.
“Me and Ryan. The kid’s got the best record for long range shots and you can run faster than I can.” Callum wasn’t embarrassed by his change in skill set since his legs were replaced with prosthetics. The man knew how to assess his strengths and weaknesses and play to them. And no one who looked at the guy would think he was anything less than deadly.
“I need to be close,” Joe said. “In case I have to get in fast. Parking in that street will be a problem. There are no public spots and as soon as a car sits there for any length of time, security from one of the houses checks them out. We need to look into parking in one of the drives close by.”
Callum made a note on the paper in front of him. “I’ll make some calls.”
“Can we get Elle to tap into their security feed, give us eyes inside the gates?” Dimitri said.
Callum made another note. Joe ran a hand through his overgrown hair. “We really need more guys. A job like this, you need bodies covering the exits.”
“We’re working on it,” Callum said. “Most of the guys Lake has in Scotland are out on jobs. We’re interviewing to fill up this office.”
“Yeah, but they won’t be here in time for this op,” Joe said.
There was silence. The team was set as is. Dimitri glanced at Joe as Callum studied the aerial photo some more.
“She said I’m perfectly adequate,” Dimitri said. “That isn’t good, right?”
Joe burst out laughing, while Callum groaned.
“What?” Dimitri demanded. “If your technique was called perfectly adequate, it’d be stuck in your head too.”
“Bloody hell.” Callum folded his a
rms over yet another grey-coloured Henley. “Get your mind on the job. Stop screwing around with Megan. It’s distracting you. Do I really need to tell you how important this is? If you want to do something useful with the woman, train her. She needs firearms training for a start.”
“Guns?” Joe looked at Callum like he was mad. “You want to put a firearm in her hand?”
“I don’t want to,” Callum snapped. “But if she’s holding one I’d rather she shot the enemy than me. Right now I wouldn’t trust her with a Taser. No, scrap that, I wouldn’t trust her with a water pistol.” He glared at Dimitri. “Now stop acting like a teenage girl and get your head in the game.”
“You’re right.” Dimitri shook his arms, working the tension out of his body. “Okay. I’m ready. No more Megan talk.”
“About bloody time.” Callum turned back to the map.
Joe nudged Dimitri and when he turned the guy passed him a piece of paper. When he opened it there was a note:
Perfectly adequate is seriously bad dude. You need to get yourself some skills.
And just like that, his mind was back on Megan.
Chapter Ten
Dimitri took Callum’s words seriously. That’s why he found himself outside Megan’s apartment door at five o’clock the next morning—he’d set up some training. As he knocked on the door, he admitted it was probably a little early to get started, but he’d spent the night tossing and turning, frustrated that things weren’t moving fast enough with the case. And what better way to work out his frustration than with Megan.
He paused. He needed to rephrase that. The images going through his head had nothing to do with combat training and a whole lot to do with the two of them in one bed. Limbs entwined. Glistening skin. Desperate moans. He broke out in a sweat at the thought. Maybe hanging out alone with Megan wasn’t such a great idea after all. He was just about to abandon his plan, in favour of a cold shower, when the door opened. He wasn’t really surprised to find Julia, rather than Megan, frowning at him.
“It’s five in the morning,” Julia said by way of hello.
Dimitri knew she wasn’t quite awake because she looked him in the eye when she spoke to him.
“You’re always first in the office. You get up early, what’s the big deal?” He walked past her and into the tiny hallway.
“I don’t get up this early,” Julia grumbled as she shut the door. “Why are you here?”
“I’ve got a training session with Megan.”
Her mouth gaped. “At five in the morning? You must have a death wish.”
Dimitri ignored her. He knew what he was doing. Mostly. “Where’s her room?”
Julia let out a long huff of air and pointed down the hall. “Last door on the right. I need a cup of tea.”
She pulled her thick brown terry robe around her and headed off to what Dimitri assumed was the kitchen, grumbling under her breath as she went. Dimitri shook his head as he watched her go, wondering if the woman owned any clothes that weren’t brown. He sauntered down the hall, taking note of every detail of his environment as a matter of habit. Dimitri knew the apartment was one of two on the top floor of the building. Back in the day, this floor would have been the servant’s accommodation. Which explained the low ceilings, tiny rooms and narrow hallways. With its cream coloured walls and grey carpet the place screamed generic rental property, which is what the whole building had been before Benson Security bought it.
Without hesitating, Dimitri knocked at Megan’s door. There was silence. He banged the door with his fist and called out, “Yo, Buffy, time to train.” Nothing. “Megan,” he shouted. There was a mumble from inside the room. It sounded a lot like, “Go to hell.” Then there was silence.
Guess she wasn’t a morning person. With a shrug, Dimitri turned the handle and let himself into Megan’s room.
The curtains were shut and the room was dark, but the light coming in from the hallway meant he could see inside the room. Under the tiny window was a double bed. Wedged into the rest of the floor space was a desk and chair, an old armchair, a set of drawers and a rickety old wardrobe. Benson Security needed to take better care of its staff. Although, to be fair, they’d put him up in a nice hotel nearby so he couldn’t complain. He wondered why Megan was living here instead of the hotel and made a mental note to ask her later.
He reached for the light switch beside the door and flicked it on. Nothing happened. He looked up and saw the lightbulb had been removed. Huh. With one generous step he was over at the desk and flicked on the pink sparkly lamp. The lump in the middle of the bed mumbled something before blonde hair disappeared under the pillow.
With a grin, he picked up one of the books piled high on the desk. What the hell? His eyebrows shot up at the title: How to be a bodyguard—personal security, the idiot’s guide. He shuffled through the rest. Beginners guide to firearms, The dummies’ book of spying, Cold War Spy Craft and How to make it as a mercenary.
Dimitri stared at the books dumbfounded. He was actually pretty glad Megan was out cold, because he was speechless. With absolutely no guilt about snooping, he switched on the open laptop to see what else the crazy woman had been doing with her spare time. Sure enough, she had bookmarks to all sorts of YouTube channels. He followed the link to the first one, where a guy in costume store fatigues was explaining what it was like to be a mercenary. Dimitri shook his head. If this guy was private security, Dimitri was Queen of England.
“Buffy, you are filling your head with a serious amount of crap,” he told the sleeping lump.
It whined, but didn’t move. Enough of this. It was time to get his partner on the straight and narrow. The whole mission depended on her pulling this off. Finding his sister depended on her. It was past time to get serious. With one quick move, he grabbed a handful of her bedding and yanked.
She screamed as he tossed the bedding to the floor. Megan was sprawled on her stomach in the middle of the bed. She wore cute pink cut-off shorts and a matching pink tank.
“What the hell?” Megan shouted from under the pillow. “Put the bedding back. My bum is freezing.”
“And what a gorgeous ass it is.” Dimitri grinned at her grunt of annoyance, but noted she still hadn’t moved. “Enough screwing around. It’s time to get up. You have training.” He folded his arms and worked on looking intimidating—if for no other reason than to get his eyes off her ass.
“Joe?”
Now that rankled.
“Not Joe. Dimitri. Rise and shine, Buffy. It’s time to play with the big boys.”
She peeked out from under the pillow. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes were dazed with sleep and she had a serious case of bed head. The sight made Dimitri stop breathing. She was stunning.
“Dimitri? What are you doing here?” She looked around as though she’d only just figured out she was in bed and he was in her room. “Why are you in my room? Where’s my bedding? Can’t you knock?”
Yeah, she was waking up alright.
“I did knock. You sleep like the dead. Now get up. Get dressed. We’ve got work to do.”
Her eyes found the clock on the shelf beside her bed. He spotted the second the time registered, as every muscle in her body went tense.
“It’s five o’clock!” It was a screech. “In the morning!”
“I’m partnered with Einstein,” Dimitri muttered.
“Oh, hell, no.” Megan scrambled up onto her hands and knees and crawled across the bed towards him.
The sight made all the blood in Dimitri’s body rush south and for a second he thought he actually saw stars. She was perfect. All curves and lean limbs. All smooth, smooth skin and lushly swaying hips. His hands tingled with the need to touch her. His mouth watered at the sight of her coming towards him and thought fled. Suddenly, he couldn’t remember why he was there and he really didn’t care. His little brain had taken over. And his little brain didn’t want to train. Nope. It didn’t want Megan out of bed. Bed is exactly where his little brain wanted to keep the woman. Poss
ibly for eternity.
He shook his head as she reached over the edge of the bed, grasped the bedding on the floor and yanked it back up onto the bed. With an adorable scowl, she wrapped herself in it like the filling in a burrito. Then with a sigh, she burrowed down, closed her eyes and went back to sleep.
What the hell?
The way she was wrapped up tight in the bedding made it impossible to snatch it away from her again. He thought about fetching a glass of water to chuck at her head. Then he had a better idea. With a wicked grin he bent, picked up the tightly wrapped woman and slung her over his shoulder.
“What are you doing? Put me down, right now!”
She wriggled and shifted, but she couldn’t fight back—her arms were wrapped up tight in her blankets.
“I told you to get up, Buff. One way or another you’re waking up and we’re gonna train.”
“Let go of me. I mean it. You are going to regret this. Put me back in bed right now. Are you listening to me? This is your last warning.”
Dimitri ignored her as he set off down the hallway, pushing at doors to see which one held the bathroom. Ah, there it was. He caught sight of movement out of the corner of his eye and looked over to find Julia staring at them.
“Got any coffee, Julia?”
She nodded, her mouth hanging open.
“Great, I’ll grab a cup while Megan takes a shower.”
He knew his grin was evil. He felt it. And he didn’t care. With a wink to Julia, he stepped into the tiny bathroom—all the while ignoring Megan’s litany of orders and curses.
The showerhead was above the bath. Perfect. He turned the water on to cold and then dumped the writhing bundle into the bath under the spray.
Reckless (Benson's Boys Book 1) Page 8