After taking in the image Dimitri sent that unequivocally confirms my Olivia is Isaac’s Ophelia, I squash my phone back against my ear. I’m tempted to smack it against my head another six times for good measure, but hold my punishment for a more appropriate time. “When did Ophelia die?”
“Six years ago—”
“Not the year. The actual date.”
I know the answer I’m seeking. I read her death certificate three times this weekend and have the ability to retain anything I read, but my brain is nothing but puree right now. I’m stunned I can talk, even more so when Dimitri replies, “January 14 th.”
It reveals I have more than a minute connection with our target’s past. It could completely fuck me over.
I bedded a mafia princess.
A mafia princess who had supposedly died nine months before we fooled around.
Fuck!
21
BRANDON
A lex’s head pops up from a family planning clinic brochure he’s perusing when I knock on his office door. Since it’s the same family clinic he requested me to hack into while on bereavement leave almost a year ago, I dither the reason for my visit for the umpteenth time the past four weeks. I understand the pain you experience when the woman you love leaves you, but I can only imagine how bad it feels to discover a receipt in her name at a clinic known for abortions.
I can’t get over the fact Melody cheated on me, but the disbelieving gasp that left Alex’s mouth when I confirmed an R. Myers had attended her appointment at Westminster Family Planning Clinic two months after they separated made me realize it could have been much worse. Melody destroyed us, but Regan destroyed something of Alex’s he can never get back. That’s a fierce burn for any man to digest.
When Alex arches his brow, prompting me that I’m the one interrupting him, not the other way around, I grind out the first excuse that pops into my head. “That report you wanted on Colt Enterprises has been uploaded to the Bureau’s servers.”
He slouches low into his chair. “Anything I need to be aware of?”
I shake my head before spinning on my heels and stalking back to my desk. Today isn’t the first time I’ve tried to come clean about my connection with Ophelia Petretti. My first attempt was the morning after I discovered Olivia Wilde, once an informant for Tobias, is Ophelia Petretti, Isaac Holt’s supposed ‘deceased’ girlfriend. Alex was adamant if it wouldn’t grant him an arrest warrant for Isaac, he wasn’t interested in anything I had to say.
He’s always been a hard-ass, but it’s grown substantially worse the morning he, Isabelle, and I had an unintended strategy meeting in the conference room at HQ. He has his sights set on one man, making him not only blind to how dangerous revenge is, but he also has no clue to the rift it’s causing his team and family. I doubt he’s even aware how deeply undercover Grayson went weeks ago. That’s how far his head is up his own ass.
I’ve only just reached my desk when Alex whizzes by. “I’ll be back in around an hour. Keep an eye on things for me until then.” I glance behind my shoulder, certain he’s talking to someone else.
When I fail to find anyone around me, I stray my eyes to his. “Me?”
“Keep playing the dumb card, Brandon. You have everyone here fooled.” Alex shoves the pamphlet for the family planning clinic into his pocket before shifting on his feet to face me, placing on his jacket at the same time. “Except me.” His words are projected at me, but his eyes reveal the real recipient of his scorn. He’s doubting no one but himself right now. He’s wearing the same look now he had last month when I told him Westminster didn’t lodge electronic documentation on the procedures their patients have. “I want Isaac’s movement sheets logged before I return.”
Stealing my chance to say they’re already uploaded, he leaves HQ. I slump into my chair before firing up my computer so I can sort through the information I was working on before my real job overtook my pretend one. There are so many threads Grayson and I are picking at, my head feels overloaded. It also feels empty. Don’t ask me how you can have two contradicting responses. I’m just telling you how it is. My fuck-up with Olivia, sorry, correction, Ophelia, almost cost me my career before I joined the Bureau. However, it was nothing compared to what it cost me personally. She’s the reason Melody and I haven’t spoken in years.
I’ve always been pissed that Melody wouldn’t give me the chance to explain myself, but when I sat down and truly looked at the facts, I understood her hesitation. The way Olivia tried to manipulate me should have disclosed her true entity long before Isabelle did, but I brushed off her nastiness as a consequence of grief.
Even to this date, details are sketchy, but one fact has never altered. I met Olivia the night her brother was abducted. Tobias needed the man assigned to Olivia’s watch on the ground. Since I wasn’t yet qualified for field service, I volunteered to babysit an alleged ‘harmless’ informant.
When Olivia was made aware of the reason for the change-up, she was clearly emotional. Since it was the anniversary of Joey’s death, I wasn’t fairing much better. We didn’t react to the instant attraction we felt until after we’d consumed two bottles of wine with a greasy pizza and pasta combination.
The instant it was over, I knew I had fucked-up. It wasn’t the fact I’d slept with an informant that had me instantly regretting my decision, it was the bitch-flip I seemingly turned on while fucking Olivia that had me backpedaling. We fucked, there’s no doubt about that. It wasn’t a sweet, let’s-take-it-slow lovemaking session, but not at one stage did Olivia ask me to stop, slow down, or any of the other words you’d expect to hear when the other half of your fuckfest isn’t in it. She screamed for more, begged me to go harder, then initiated a second round the next morning when we woke in a groggy, twisted mess.
It was then that she mentioned how much trouble I could be in if I didn’t do as asked. I stared at her, shocked as fuck at her gall. She wasn’t just attempting to blackmail me into sleeping with her again, she wanted information she wasn’t privy to. Hell, at the time, I wasn’t even privileged to the files she wanted.
When I refused to bow to her demands, she said she’d say the event we undertook the night before wasn’t mutually agreed upon. I told her to go ahead with her plans, aware intimidation was the highest form of flattery.
I assumed she’d back down.
I was dead fucking wrong.
She hung me out to dry, her deception only losing steam when she found another sucker to sink her claws into. The last I heard, they married within weeks of him being assigned to her case. Yep, you heard me right. He was a fellow agent. As far as I’m aware, he still works for the Bureau, although I don’t know in what position or where. Tobias pulled me so far off Olivia’s case. Up until four weeks ago, I hadn’t heard her name in years, much less had an awareness of her real identity.
I wish I had paid more attention. Not only would it have saved Tobias months of grief, I wouldn’t be feeling the scold of Olivia’s burn years later. Fortunately for me, I got out after one sting. Her husband can’t say the same thing.
