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“Will you and Leo be there too?”
“No. This one is just for you. I’m too likely to just shoot them all, and X wants an actual plan with forethought and finesse. He’s got me and Leo tracking some missing teens that might have been part of this and might be a separate problem.”
That meant X already had a specific angle to work. Did he know more than what Giorgio had told me? “Why me particularly?”
“One of the rumors involves Arlington, and since you’ve also found evidence to point to his potential involvement…”
When we’d put an end to the asshole who’d been harassing Giorgio’s boyfriend, Lane, we’d learned that he was connected to some men who were also part of the human trafficking ring we’d been trying to bring down for ages. I’d initially dismissed Arlington as too vapid and simple-minded to be part of an operation that was so well concealed, then I’d heard he was hosting an intimate party on a small island off the coast of St. Croix and hoping to lure in someone for an investment opportunity.
“So he is part of this shit?”
“Sounds like it. X will give you more details tomorrow.”
“Just because I made the connection with Arlington, there’s no reason I need to be the one who pursues it. Who is this informant?”
“Like I said, X will give you the details.”
“Gio!”
He huffed. “You know I hate that name.”
“Tell me.”
“Marco Ricci.”
“Fuck.” The one name I did not want to hear. It had been a year since the night I’d been stupid enough to let him fuck me. I’d jerked off to the memory countless times. I’d wanted to call him up and ask him to take me again, to force me so I had no choice, but I hadn’t been dumb enough to actually do it. “I’m not working with him.”
“Look, I know how you—”
“No, you don’t.” I’d never told anyone about that night with Marco, and while I might think he was an asshole, I knew he hadn’t either.
“If you’re worried he’s not loyal because his cousin was involved with trafficking, I believe Marco truly broke with his family. The Marchesis trust him, and the times I’ve worked with him, my instincts said he was solid.”
“That’s not the problem.”
Giorgio sighed. “Just talk to X.”
“I will, and I’ll tell him the same thing I told you. I’m not working with Marco.”
“Have fun with that.”
It was not easy to say no to our boss.
I showered, then lay awake for another hour, wondering what X would ask me to do and how I would get out of it. Would he listen if I insisted it was best for me to work on this alone?
The meeting with X was even worse than I’d anticipated.
“You want me to do what?” I asked when he told me his plan for me and Marco to attend Arlington’s party. I hadn’t been undercover since my last mission with the FBI counterterrorism team, and that had been a total goatfuck that had left me shaken and unsure I could work in the field anymore.
“I know you were listening, and you’re quite capable of comprehending a simple plan.”
My cold FBI agent persona fled as anger rushed through me. I rose from my chair and slapped my hands on the desk. “I already told you I’m not—”
“Sit down and remember where you are.”
Fuck. What was I doing? X and I were meeting at Devilish Ink, Leo’s tattoo shop. As far as we knew, no one—other than the clients we brought there—was aware that the shop served as a base for Vigilance’s operations. Me yelling at X wasn’t going to help keep our secret.
It was rare for me to lose my head like that, but anything that made me think of that horrible day when… I pushed the thoughts away. If I’d learned anything in the FBI, it was how to hide my feelings and wait for what I wanted, but the longer I worked for X, the more my federal-agent mask slipped. That worried me. I didn’t want to go back to being as lost as I’d felt in my early twenties. Sometimes I wondered if it had been wrong for me to leave the Bureau. Were the rules and expectations of my superiors the only thing making me who I was? Not that X didn’t have expectations. He had plenty, but the only rules that mattered were the ones we made up, and they were ever changing.
“How confident are you in Marco’s loyalty?” If Giorgio thought he needed defending, that might be a weak spot I could attack, but X thoroughly vetted everyone we worked with. Between his network of informants and Emilio, the hacker genius he had on retainer, he was able to find out damn near everything, but no amount of information could ever put together the entire picture about a person. For that, you had to see them in action. That was another important lesson I’d learned as a federal agent. Even with all my knowledge, someone I trusted had betrayed me on my final mission. Could I really trust my own judgement while undercover again?
