Page 70 of His Forbidden Alliance

“I didn’t want to be right. Why does everyone think I’m an idiot?”

“I don’t. I wouldn’t be working with you if I did.”

“You’re telling me you didn’t think I’d be the easiest Theriot to contact?”

Fuck. I was not going to admit that. “You’re the Theriot in charge of the casino where my informant said I could find a link to Ivanov, and it doesn’t matter what I thought before I met you. I know you now, and I know how capable you are.”

“What do we do now? We no longer have a contact at the casino, and we can’t interrogate that fucker since he’s rotting away in his house.”

“We need to find out if anyone new had been hired at the casino in the last few days.”

He laid a hand on top of mine as he slung us around a corner. “You think Ivanov sent in someone else?”

“Do you think he would?”

Rafe huffed. “I don’t know. You’re the fucking investigator.”

I wasn’t going to let him dismiss himself like that. “Remington trusted you with this for a reason. You read people well. The first time I stepped into your office, you knew something was off, that I wasn’t just an overconfident con man, and I’m damn good at undercover work.”

He nodded. “All right. Fine. I agree. If Ivanov got rid of LeBlanc because he fucked up, then he’ll send someone else. He’s not giving up the blackmail scheme, because if you assume I’m nothing but playboy fluff, then it’s a damn good plan.”

“Right, but we’re going to need to go at this a different way because there’s a huge chance Ivanov now knows we were onto his guy. We cannot tip him off that we know more.”

“Yeah, but how⁠—”

“I think it’s finally time we bring your family in.”

28

RAFE

“No. I already told you why that is a terrible idea.”

“Rafe, listen to me.” Zach stroked my thigh. Even though I was fairly sure he was trying to comfort me, not seduce me, it was distracting as fuck.

“We’re not talking to my family. I won’t let them near you.”

Zach’s hand tightened on my leg. I glanced over at him. He was staring at me.

“They aren’t going to listen to me. They’ll see you as a threat, no matter what X said. They aren’t going to believe you mean the family no harm.”

“You don’t have to tell them I’m a fed.”

“They’ll figure it out. They’re likely looking into you already because I⁠—”

He squeezed hard enough to hurt. “What did you tell them?”

“Stop.” I pushed at his arm. “Let go of me.”

He jerked his hand back. “Fuck. I’m sorry. I just…”

“I told Dante a new guy joined my top game and that I liked him.” That was close enough to the truth. He didn’t need to know anything about Dante’s speculation.

“You said⁠—”

Oh fuck. No. I couldn’t admit… “I mean, I said I wanted to fuck the guy—you.” Zach was smiling way too much. I couldn’t deal with this and him wanting to bring in my family.

“Rafe. What did you actually say?”