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Adam crossed his arms over his massive chest. “Is that a fact?”
No matter what he said, Marcus knew it would be taken the wrong way. “Get bent, Adam.”
Adam threw his head back and laughed. “You’re such an easy target.”
Marcus tried to ignore him and hoped it would go away, but, as with everything in TFH, that would not be the end of it. Autumn Bradford, the ex-DEA agent Del hired around the same time as Tamilya, stepped out of her office with a quizzical look on her face.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing,” Marcus said.
“Marcus and Tamilya have to work together on a case.”
Autumn looked at Marcus with her eyebrows raised. “Really?”
“We’ve worked together these last few months. I don’t know why everyone is so freaked out about it.”
Autumn took a sip of her coffee and studied him. When she did this—and she did it a lot—he always felt like a specimen in a lab. It wasn’t just the way she looked at him. He’d seen her look at everyone that way, including suspects. He knew her social skills were unique after being raised in a cult, but it was unsettling when she lasered in on him. Now he knew why she was such a good interrogator. He was ready to tell her anything she wanted as long as she quit staring at him.
“Well, because you got it bad for the woman.”
He wanted to growl but that would make Adam laugh. Again.
“I didn’t ask your opinion.”
“Yes you did. You said you didn’t know why everyone was so freaked out about it. We’re intrigued because you two had a very short, intense relationship.”
He wanted to just walk into his office, slam the door, and ignore them both. There were two reasons he couldn’t do that. One was that it would prove their point, but the second was how Autumn described their relationship.
“How do you know it was short and intense?”
It had been, but it wasn’t like he’d told anyone the details. Had Tamilya? He knew Tamilya and Autumn had hit it off since they knew a lot of the same people.
“Well, if it had been long and then died out, there wouldn’t be all this heat between you. If it had been long and intense, you would still be angry. So, short, intense, and incomplete.”
He hated that she was so close to the truth. At least she didn’t know that he had been the idiot to walk away. Or at least, he hoped she didn’t. He knew there were a few people wondering, but he was the only one who knew what an ass he had been. Assuming that just because she had said she loved him and that she wanted happily ever after was stupid. He’d panicked and run. Within a few days, he had known he’d made a huge mistake, but she refused to give in. She hadn’t been mean about it. Worse, she had been politely dismissive. The woman could cut glass with her tone.
“How do you know all this?” he asked.
Autumn shrugged. “I’m good at reading people. Kind of important when your father is a whacked out of his mind cult leader.”
Her father had run a cult on the Big Island. He knew a little about it, but mostly that he was running guns and drugs through the entire camp. He had been the biggest supplier of Ice on that island for years. Not to mention his issues with having ten or so wives, most of them under the age of fifteen. He couldn’t even imagine what it had been like for her. Her escape had been the downfall of her father.
“It also helped when I worked undercover with the DEA.”
“I didn’t know you did that,” he said. He had known she was in the DEA, but he had no idea she had been undercover. People who excelled at that—and he had no reason not to think she excelled—were always a little on edge. They had to play a delicate balancing act between the worlds of law enforcement and the drug business.
She offered him a toothy grin and, not for the first time, he thought she was younger than her thirty years. She looked like she’d just graduated from college.
“I was really good at it. I can play the space cadet and people buy into it. They always thought I was stupid. Taking them down was damned satisfying.”
He smiled, enjoying her bloodthirsty tone. He could understand it. When he did a little undercover work, he always liked letting racists think he was stupid.
“If you liked it so much, why did you leave?”
She sighed. “UC work has its drawbacks.” Then she didn’t elaborate, but that was par for the course for her. She could dig under anyone’s skin, but no one had really cracked her. He would know because it was impossible to keep secrets in the TFH Ohana.
Tamilya stepped out of her office and for a second, he couldn’t think. She was dressed all in black. Dark jeans and t-shirt, along with black boots, which made her look like a badass. The gun on her hip and the sunglasses he knew she would put on the moment they stepped outside made her close to irresistible. She used to wear her hair straight with extensions, but since starting to work with TFH, she’d gone natural. It didn’t matter what she did with her hair or how she dressed, he would always want her. He knew that would never change, but he wasn’t sure on how to go about getting another chance with her.
