Page 22 of To Catch a Sub

“I’m not actually sure.” Her lips twitched with a smile.

Wow, that was a hell of a smile.

Landon wasn’t sure why he was sitting here having such a casual conversation with a woman whose name he didn’t know. Maybe it was the atmosphere—two of them alone in this vast, dramatically lit room. Maybe it was that shockingly intense reaction he’d had when they touched.

“If there isn’t a complete inventory, is this another partial one?” He pointed at the papers.

“Yes. Sort of.” She pushed her glasses up. “It’s the closest thing to comprehensive I think is possible.” She leaned over and tapped the papers. “I got lists from every department, and not just their inventory lists, but repair lists, loan lists.” She raised her shoulders in a fatalistic shrug. “I compiled it all.”

“Thank you... I still don’t know your name.” Once more he held out his hand, wanting to see if those first touches had been flukes.

She studied his hand for a moment, and then one of her brows rose slightly, a knowing, interested expression crossing her face.

She grasped his hand.

Awareness tingled through him, and he watched the way she once more wet her lower lip with the tip of her tongue.

Not a fluke.

“What’s your name?” His voice was lower, both in tone and volume, than it should have been given this was a professional situation, not a date or a pre-scene meeting.

She pulled her hand from his, looking at it before tucking it onto her lap. “Colette Beaumont.”

* * *

“The clubs weren’t intended to be a safe house.” Rolf Pederson folded his arms across his leather-covered chest.

“I know that. You know that.” Landon turned away from his laptop and tossed a handful of joggers into the open suitcase on the bed. “My boss may or may not know that. Either way, I have my orders.”

“How long are you going to be here?” Rolf asked.

Landon rested an elbow on the top of his tall chest of drawers, where he’d placed the laptop so he could talk to Rolf while he packed. “I have no idea.”

“Will you be heading the investigation into the information your witness provides?”

“She’s not my witness.”

Rolf’s brows rose a fraction of an inch. For him it was a big reaction.

“She came to me because she thinks she can manipulate me the way she did before.”

Rolf’s brows rose further.

“Oh shut up, you twat.” Landon jerked open a drawer and started pulling out underwear and socks.

A booming laugh made Landon turn back to the screen. Andrei had joined Rolf. Where Rolf was taciturn to the point of sometimes coming off as rude—at least in the vanilla world—Andrei was whip-smart and always had a cutting comment or sarcastic retort.

Like Landon, Andrei and Rolf were both Doms.

They were also, again like Landon, Interpol agents.

Rolf was dressed for the club in Dom leathers—black leather pants and a vest, while Andrei looked like he’d just stepped out of a high-level meeting in a dress shirt and tie, with his suit jacket hooked on one finger and draped over his shoulder.

“You are a twat,” Andrei told Rolf. “And not the kind of twat I like to play with.”

“Do you even know what that word means?” Rolf’s expression was unreadable, but then again, it usually was. He could be pissed, or genuinely curious about Andrei’s mastery of English.

“Do you? I may not have grown up speaking English, but I’m better at sounding like an actual human than you are, no matter what language.” Andrei tossed his jacket somewhere off screen.