“It’s usually the last thing I want to do, too.” I press a kiss to his knuckles, a quiet snicker bubbling along my throat. “But I seem to recall this super mature decision we made recently about talking our problems through, rather than letting them fester. I’m not saying you owe him a conversation, and I’m not saying your anger isn’t valid.” I lower our hands and stretch taller instead. “I’m sayingyoudeserve not to carry this pain anymore. And although I’m not taking Drake’s side?—”
His eyes narrow.
“Iamsaying he was a kid back then, too, and last I heard, he left the DEA because he didn’t agree with a lot of the crap he was expected to do while carrying that badge. Besides, Rory is honestly so fricken sweet, I can’t see a world where someone like her would love a guy who didn’t deserve it.” I wrap my hands around the sides of his neck andknowwe’re running out of time. Pulling myself up, I breathe a sigh of pleasure as his palms grip my hips and his lips latch onto mine. He kisses me with more energy than when we started. His fingers hold me with more fervor. His eyes seem just a little lighter. And that’s enough.For now. “It’d be kinda fun to put Drake and Felix in a boxing ring, don’t you think? Take their shirts off, ya know, for flexibility and whatnot.”
He jerks back and studies me through slitted eyes. “Excuse me?”
“To work through their beef. It would be a sweaty event, so for their own comfort, taking their shirts away would be best.”
“Minka!”
“What? You want to see Felix call this mess out, and I want to see Felix shirtless.” I spasm and jump as his grip grows tighter. “I mean, I want to see him happy! Healed. Better.”
“You don’t get to see my brother like that!” He crushes me against his chest and latches his teeth onto my neck.
A loud squeal tears along my throat, loud enough that anyone outside this room would probably hear us.
“The fuck is wrong with you?” He drags the collar of my blouse to the side and suckles on the soft skin covering my clavicle. “These new wonder drugs are making you reckless, Mayet. That thing with Agosti ain’t shit compared to you checking out my brother.”
“That’s worse?”
“So much worse!” He snarls. But I swear, his chest bounces too. His gloomy mood steps aside and makes way for just a little happiness to creep in. “You’re forbidden fromeverspeaking to my brothers again.”
“Ever?”
“Ever!”
“Oh thank God. Finally.” I slide my fingers through his hair and tug his head back. Then I look into his eyes and sink deeper into the man he is. “I’ll block them all on my phone just as soon as we’re done in here. If Felix takes issue with this new development, I’m certain you can handle those communications on my behalf. Now come on.” I climb backward off his lap, stumbling to my own feet and resting my hands on his shoulders for balance. Then I twine our fingers and pull him off his stool, too. “You’ve got work to do, and I’ve gotta stand still for a photo. Then I guess I have to listen to Preston drone on about computers and tech wizards and other super annoying bailiwick words.”
“Bailiwick?” He follows me toward the door, dragging his feet for every step we take. “What the fuck is bailiwick?”
“An annoying word, obviously. Catch up, Detective.”
MINKA
There are different kinds of smart people in this world. There are those who work inside this building and know their way around the human body. They can identify a person’s sex based on the shape of their pelvis or the length of a bone. They can assess illness long after a disease ends a life, and they can stand inside a courtroom and speak for a person who was otherwise silenced.
Then there are smart people like Sophia Solomon and Preston Danes. Like Theo Griffin, who works on the fifteenth floor of my building and kind of reminds me of aPinky and the Brainepisode from my childhood.
“We’ve got you set up with a centralized security management platform. That’s where everything goes: cameras, access control, logins, alarms, sensors.”
“So it’s like the mother computer, taking care of all the baby computers?”
Preston’s lips twitch with the laughter he wants so badly to shut down. “Yes, Chief. This is your mommy computer.” He gestures across my exceptionally messy fifteenth floor. “She secures all the rest and processes data locally to reduce latency. She’s encrypted, so all devices inside the George Stanley communicate over a segmented network, and comes with a failsafe in case of a system failure.”
“Which means?”
He settles back on his heels and digs one hand into his pocket. The other holds his trusty laptop. “It means if the zombie apocalypse arrives,power grids are down, a bolt of lightning strikes your building,andone of your staff members opens a dumb email from a fake ass prince in a third world country,allat the same time, the failsafe will kick in and handle the situation. I’ll also be notified, so I can keep an eye on things.”
“Handy. Will you know specifically which of my staff is communicating with the prince?”
A silent snicker bounces through his chest. “Yes, Chief. I will. I can then add more layers of stop-fucking-around to that person’s devices to curb their stupidity. Hopefully that won’t be necessary, but it’s there, just in case.”
“Doctor Raquel seems the type.Definitelykeep an eye on her communications.”
He inclines his chin. “Noted. We’ve set you up with 4K IP cameras, with low-light and thermal imaging, pan-tilt tracking, facial recognition, and behavioral analytics.”
“Behavioral?”
