He could pound me into the pavement, and not in the fun, oh-yes-harder kind of way.
Did he know somehow that I’d bought those books for him? Had it pissed him off, set him off in some way I hadn’t anticipated? What the hell had I gotten myself into?
“What are you doing here?” My voice came out high and shaky. Fuck, because I really needed humiliation on top of my shock and fright. “Were you following me?”
Ah yes, stupid questions were definitely the way to take the high ground and look less weak. I tried to hide my wince at my own idiocy.
Hot Dude frowned at me. Frowned more. I hadn’t seen him smile yet, I realized. Not even for a second, even when he was laughing about something in a book.
He shrugged, making his big shoulders look bigger. “No,” he said. “Just taking a walk.”
Right. So convincing. “Taking a walk behind that tree in the same park I’m in?”
Was that a slight flush along his cheekbones? Hard to tell in the sunset light. “It’s a public park.” He took a step forward, and I fell back two. “And I wasn’t behind the tree.”
“Yes you were!” My voice rose, and I took another step.
He followed me, and I stumbled one more step—and my back hit the side of the small building with a jarring thud.
Fuck. Nowhere else to go, and Hot, Menacing Dude kept advancing, until he stopped less than three feet from me. Close enough to reach out and touch.
Close enough for him to reach out and kill me.
“So maybe I followed you,” he said slowly, his dark eyes fixed on my face. I couldn’t tear my own gaze away. He had me pinned against the wall and he hadn’t even touched me. His voice dipped even lower, to a rasp that I felt all the way down my spine. “Maybe I wanted to get to know you.”
Oh, fuck. My cock hardened, pressing against the fly of my too-tight jeans. If he’d followed me and hidden behind a tree because he wanted to accost me in the park and fuck in a bush or something, well…that was creepy as hell. Better than wanting to mug me or kill me, although I guessed they weren’t mutually exclusive.
Creepy. But. Yeah, my cock hadn’t gotten that memo. And my racing heart and heaving lungs didn’t seem to understand that their state of excitement didn’t mean anything good. Goddamn autonomic responses. Only mine seemed to have bypassed flight by backing me into a wall, skipped the whole fight thing by not even knowing how, and shot straight into fuck, which wasn’t in most of the scientific literature but maybe should’ve been.
Hot Maybe-Creepy Dude had looked rough around the edges but no worse than that in the quiet, respectable atmosphere of Vino and Veritas. Here in the park, with twilight creeping in and casting everything in shades of lavender and reddish shadow, he looked menacing as hell: bigger, scruffier, more dangerous.
I swallowed hard, not missing how his eyes flicked down to my throat for a second, and finally found my voice. “What do you want?” I’d tried for challenging, but it came out husky and a little plaintive. Like I’d really said something more like, Looking for a good time?
He took another step, putting him squarely into my personal space. I caught a faint thread of the scent of him, leather and man, just like I’d imagined. Oh God.
“I’m kind of new in town,” he said, still staring right into my eyes. I pressed my hands back against the side of the building, concrete rough beneath my sweaty palms. “Where does a guy go to have fun in Burlington, anyway? You kind of look like you’d know.”
He looked down, pointedly doing a sweep of me from my purple Chucks, up my skinny legs, over my chest—lingering there for a second; could he see the outline of my right nipple piercing through my shirt?—and back up to my ear piercings and multicolored hair. He landed right back on my eyes again. His own seemed wider and darker. Dilated. Yeah, he liked what he’d seen.
Fuck it. Maybe there was something wrong with me—okay, I knew there was something wrong with me. I always went for the wrong guys, and this was wronger than usual.
But fuck it, seriously. I’d never been cornered in a park by a guy who looked like he could break me in half, and maybe I’d been missing out. Not like I could get away if I wanted to.
And I really, really didn’t want to.
Because my cock had only gotten harder, and as I licked my lips, Hot Stalker Dude’s eyes definitely went wide.
On impulse, because if I’d thought about it I never would’ve, I reached out and grabbed him by the front of his jacket, tugging as hard as I could. I’d taken him off guard, and he stumbled forward, landing against me, his bulk pressing me into the wall. He felt like a wall himself, hard and huge, but warm and perfect…and he had enough height on me that all I could see was the stubbled curve of his jaw.
“We could have fun right here,” I said, as seductively as I could. And I tipped my head up and went for a kiss.
3
Alec
His soft lips brushed mine, and my brain stuttered to a halt like a stalled-out engine. Probably a drug dealer, said the voice of reason, promptly drowned out by his soft moan as he flicked his tongue against my mouth.
Fuck, I could do anything. I had him pressed up against the wall, his slim body trapped. I could kiss him, shove his legs apart and rut between them, get myself off, feel him squirm and shiver, hear him groan or whimper when I made him come.
I pulled away, wrenching my jacket out of his hands, his lips clinging to mine for a second, a tease that went straight to my cock.
I wanted to shove him up against the wall and shake the truth out of him, and then fuck him so hard he screamed. And that pissed me off more than anything else about this fucked-up situation.
Instead, I forced myself to take a step back. And then one more, because he’d fallen back against the wall, his fingers digging into the concrete again, his lips already pink and a little swollen, his eyes wide and dilated. Blue, and gray, and green. Not just one, but all of them at once, like a cloudy sky reflecting off the ocean.
Knowing what color his eyes were didn’t satisfy me as much as I’d thought it would. They shouldn’t be that goddamn pretty.
His chest rose and fell too quickly under that ridiculously thin t-shirt, and…fuck, was that a nipple piercing?
I forced my eyes back to his face. Not much better in terms of getting myself under control, but at least his face wasn’t completely X-rated.
Except for his lips. Fuck.
“I wasn’t looking for that,” I said, my voice low and harsh. Or at least I hadn’t known that’s what I’d been looking for until I almost had it. Fuck. And I’d virtually said I had been, anyway. Backpedal. Backpedal fast. “Not in a park, anyway. I meant it about getting to know you. I was curious about you. And I haven’t been in Burlington for long. I thought I had a job lined up, but it fell through. Now I’m kind of at loose ends. Looking to meet some people.”
Meet some people. Jesus. That wasn’t me. Jenna would laugh herself sick if she could hear me.
But I needed to find out what the fuck this guy’s angle was, which meant finding a way to keep him talking. Spend a little time with him.
Taking him back to his place and screwing his brains out counts as spending time with him.
Fuck that, not a chance. There were lines I didn’t cross, and fucking someone I suspected of being a criminal in order to gain his confidence transcended a line. That was more like a demilitarized zone.
“Meet some people,” he replied slowly, flicking his tongue against his lower lip in a way that had my thoughts circling right back to X-rated. “Okay. Um. You followed me to the park? Why didn’t you introduce yourself? You could’ve just met me instead of stalking me.”
I hesitated, not sure if I should tip my hand about knowing he’d bought me the books. Probably better to just go for it. Take the direct approach. It gave me a reason for following him, specifically, and his reaction might tell me a lot more than dancing around it would.
And then he cut me off and left me speechless all at once.
> “Look, I know it was weird to buy books for you,” he said in a rush. “I’m guessing you figured it out? But I like books. And it looked like you like books too. And it sucks to like books but not be able to aff— I mean, you know, it was like, a random act of kindness. I’m sorry if it freaked you out!”
A…random act of kindness? Books about drug cartels, left for a fucking FBI agent working a drug trafficking case? I couldn’t decide if he thought I was an idiot, or if he was an idiot. Both couldn’t be ruled out.
All right. Fine. I’d follow his lead.
And I’d play dumb.
“Yeah, it was a little weird,” I said. “But hey. I mean, it’s flattering.” I shot him a smile I hoped came off more charming than menacing. “Still weird.”
He shook his head and laughed, his expression rueful. “Okay, I get where you’re coming from. But I’d seen you looking at that shelf a bunch of times. I picked out the books you’d been looking at, and then a couple more at random. I wasn’t sending you a coded message or anything, really.” He paused, looking up at me through ridiculously long eyelashes. That message wasn’t coded at all, and I had to grind my teeth and hope my erection didn’t show through my jeans. “If you don’t think I’m too weird, we could hang out?”
Where would a party-boy maybe-criminal meet up with his like-minded friends? For fuck’s sake, I’d only seen thirty in the rearview mirror a year ago. I wasn’t old.
“Were you headed home? We could meet up at a club later.”
He blinked at me and bit his lip. “Yeah,” he said slowly. “I was. Um. Maybe…I wasn’t really planning on that tonight.” He sounded dubious, bordering on reluctant.
Okay, so the club idea might be a no-go. Well, if I couldn’t get him to go out with me somewhere I could scope out his contacts, that left me with getting to know him in a more personal way.
Which brought me right back to crossing the demilitarized zone. I’d never done that, though undercover agents certainly did sometimes. It wasn’t the most ethical means of gathering information, and not the preferred means, either, but that didn’t mean it didn’t happen. Fuck.
I tried another smile. “I’m Alec, by the way.”
“Gabe,” he said, with a faint smile of his own. “I guess we skipped a step there.”
He pushed himself off the wall, shifting slightly to the side so that he wasn’t trapped between it and me anymore. His body language screamed wariness, from the tense set of his shoulders to the way his eyes kept flicking to the side, like he wanted to scope out his escape route.
Shit. I’d had him on the hook, and I could see him in the act of sliding right off and escaping.
Shit, shit, shit. I could show interest without actually taking the step of tackling him onto the nearest surface, right? Again. Although to be fair, he’d pulled me. Yeah, Jenna and AD Kyle would be really fucking impressed by that explanation. The tiny twink overpowered me, and I was forced to kiss him and then take him home and fuck him. It wasn’t my fault!
“Yeah, I guess we did. Maybe a few other steps too, right?” He nodded, and a little of the tension bled out of him. “What if I just—you know, walk you home? And maybe you can give me your number. We could, I don’t know. Have a drink at that bar attached to the bookstore.”
Too late, I realized that didn’t really fit the image I’d tried to project so far. Unemployed randos didn’t hang around queer-friendly wine bars. Any kind of wine bars, really.
Gabe’s eyebrows rose. “Is that really your scene?”
Fuck. Maybe he wasn’t so stupid after all.
“Not so much, but if it’s yours, you know. I could give it a try.”
That earned me a much more genuine smile, one that lit up his pretty face and brightened his eyes. “I’m not that picky. We could—um, okay. Why don’t you give me your number and I’ll text you tomorrow?”
I really wanted his address and phone number, not just to give out mine. But I’d get there, and I had to swallow my impatience. “Sure. Got your phone?”
He pulled it out of his pocket and put in the number I recited to him, and then he hesitated and typed for a second. My phone vibrated in my pocket.
“I figured you might as well have mine too,” he said, and then tucked his phone away. “Maybe tomorrow, right? We can meet up. If you actually want to meet up with me, and you’re not just bored.” He shook his head and laughed a little. “Or that too, I guess.”
What the hell? The mixed messages coming off of this guy were making my head spin. Maybe he really had randomly bought me those books. I didn’t believe in coincidence, but at this point I simply didn’t know what to believe. Successful investigations involved holding a few different ideas in your head at once, and following each path simultaneously. Belief had almost nothing to do with it…but Gabe had thrown enough different ideas at me that I’d started to think he might be doing the unlikeliest thing of all: telling me the truth.
“Whatever works,” I said, going for casual. “Sure you don’t want me to walk you home? I hear shady guys hang out in this park. Might need a bodyguard.”
Gabe laughed, shaking his head. “Right. No, I’m good. Thanks though. Tomorrow, okay?”
And with one more lingering look at me, a look that darted down to encompass a lot more than just my face, he headed off up the hill.
“See you then,” I called after him, and got an over-the-shoulder wave. He picked up the pace, his surprisingly long legs eating up the distance.
I debated following him, but I’d done that once. He’d be listening for footsteps and keeping an eye out. Much better to let him go for now.
And the view really couldn’t be beat. Fuck, that ass. My mouth watered.
I would not be fucking him, and I’d spend as much time in a cold shower that evening as I needed to until my body got the memo.
And I’d run his phone number. That might cool me off a little too, depending on what I found.
I stared at my laptop screen in disbelief.
Gabriel John Middleton, twenty-seven years old. He had pink hair with black tips in his DMV photo, although his license told me he was blond. Five foot nine. My mind made a quick note of those stats; the only photos in my case file showing possible suspects, one from behind and one in partial, blurry profile, were of tall, dark-haired men. Gabe apparently weighed one hundred and twenty-five pounds.
And he had an adorable, mischievous little half-smile in the photo, but I had to fucking ignore that if I wanted to keep my sanity.
I’d expected a criminal record, but Gabe’s history shone as clean and pristine as a choir boy’s.
Which would have been good news if his father hadn’t owned Middleton Marine. And the last time I’d seen that name, it’d been on the top of AD Kyle’s list of companies whose facilities and boats were possibly being used to smuggle fentanyl across Lake Champlain.
The urge to head-desk hit me harder than the desk would’ve. Gabe had a connection—a clear, obvious connection—to one of my leads. But he hadn’t seemed excited about the idea of going out to party, and he’d done the confused routine so convincingly I’d been ready to take him at face value after all.
But what were the odds that he’d pick me up in a bookstore and then turn out to be related to someone I was investigating?
My computer dinged, letting me know the rest of the background check had come back.
After scrolling through it in mounting bewilderment, I sat back in the desk chair, already rubbing at my temples to try to forestall the headache I knew I had coming.
The background check had filled in a few of the blanks and given me a more complete picture: rich kid, with connections and a master’s degree in chemistry, although he’d dropped out of his doctoral program the year before. No job. No debt.
How had I fucked up so spectacularly in only one day? Nothing, nothing at all going on with this case, and I’d taken the one lead I’d had, that had dropped into my lap—no, fuck, not thinking about Gabe in my lap—and
gotten the approach completely wrong. A low-level dealer or party boy would’ve been just the right target for the smarmy charm I’d put on earlier in the evening.
But the guy I had on my screen…that guy wouldn’t have the slightest interest in who I’d portrayed myself to be.
And yet he’d given me his number.
So either he thought I might be good for a little fun—and if so, why hadn’t he just taken me home with him?—or he knew I was an FBI agent after all, and he’d played me like a cheap violin. On paper, he came equipped to be a drug kingpin: rich, bored, knowledge of pharmaceuticals, access to aquatic transportation. A whole big company to hide behind, where he could launder the money, too.
And yet he’d looked up at me with those wide eyes and that vulnerable smile, and claimed to have bought me the books as a random act of kindness.
I really wanted to believe he’d meant it.
Also, what drug kingpin would buy an FBI agent a book about Pablo Escobar? I kept coming back to that. No one who could get a master’s in chemistry, or successfully smuggle that volume of fentanyl, for that matter, could be that dumb.
Rubbing my temples simply wasn’t cutting it.
I got up and paced the hotel room, back and forth from the window looking out on the brick wall across the alley behind the hotel to the deadbolted door. I’d fucked up. No way around it. I had to change tacks tomorrow, and I winced at the inadvertent sailing metaphor. Jesus Christ, I had boats on the brain.
Boats owned by the family of the guy I wanted to fuck, possibly needed to seduce, and definitely had to investigate.
I stopped in the middle of the room, breathing hard, my fists clenched. Professional. I was a goddamn professional. Six years in the FBI. Four years in the Air Force. And three years in college before that, powering through a degree in history that hadn’t done much for me besides make me employable on paper—unless you counted an encyclopedic knowledge of the royal family of Portugal.
Undercover (Vino and Veritas) Page 3