Page 77 of Brooks

“Perfect,” Tatiana muttered.

“Leon Brown is a pissant. We’ll worry about him after you take down Prince Douchebag Al Issa. Your mission’s been approved for tomorrow night. Tex is taking the lead on intel. He’ll guide you in. Tatiana was right. After the shipment of goods was transferred, only four guards remained. Zero-dark-thirty you’re a go.”

I waited for Tatiana to perk up a little at confirmation she’d called the play correctly, but it never came. She was folding into herself, arms crossed in a protective gesture, a frown marred her pretty face. The only good sign I saw was she looked pissed. Steely determination shone in her eyes.

“Copy that. We’ll be ready,” Declan said, not taking his eyes off Tatiana.

“I’ll be in touch. Out.”

Zane disconnected and no one spoke. I think we were all waiting to see what Tatiana would say or do, but when she remained silent, Max stepped in front of her.

“You should be happy,” he told her.

“Happy? A man I trusted tried to have me killed.”

“Yep. He sure did. And he would have if you weren’t good at your job. Better than he’d thought, which makes you dangerous. In this line of work, dangerous is the best thing you can be. It also means fucktards like Brown are gonna be gunnin’ for you. Stay sharp, stay one step ahead, and stay dangerous. Good news for you is, you have the rest of us at your back and a new boss who won’t try and kill you.”

Max was correct on all accounts and I was happy he’d been the one to point them out to her. Though she didn’t seem to believe him.

“Go get some rest. We have shit to do in the morning and it’s gonna be a long night tomorrow.” Declan slapped Max on the back as he passed. “Max is right, Tatiana. Leon Brown wouldn’t have tried to kill you if he hadn’t thought you were a threat. The hit proves you’re a damn good investigator and a good operator. You should sleep well tonight knowing your instincts are spot on. Let all the other bullshit roll off.”

With a chin lift to Max, I tugged Tatiana toward the hall. He’d stay up and take watch until Kyle got up to relieve him. I closed the door behind us and knelt in front of Tatiana, untying her boots and pulling them off. When I stood, she still looked like she was lost in her head. She let me take off her tac vest, her shirt, her pants, and lead her to the bed. Once she was situated under the sheet, I quickly divested my clothes and climbed in next to Tatiana.

“Doll?” I opened my arms and waited.

Without hesitation she curled into my side and rested her arm across my stomach. Damn, she felt good wrapped around me.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Yeah. Just sucks I was so wrong about Leon.” There was nothing to say to that, so I just held her and waited. “Something feels off. I can’t put my finger on it, and it’s driving me crazy. The connection between Lucre and Falcon wasn’t hard to find. It took me all of an hour to discover it. It was easy.”

“Maybe easy for you. He might’ve thought it was buried deep enough that the connection wouldn’t be found.”

“No. I’m telling you it was right there. Payments from Lucre to different warehouses that Falcon Holdings own. It wasn’t hidden, anyone could’ve found it.”

“You don’t give yourself enough credit, Doll. But say it was too easy why would Leon want you to find it?”

“That’s what’s bothering me. I don’t think it’s the Lucre and Falcon connection that Leon’s worried about. I think it’s Ashaki Maloof.”

“The agent posing as Matek’s daughter?”

“Yeah. I mean, all of that was fucked. Nothing makes sense about why he’d pretend she was his daughter. And did he ever really have a daughter?”

“Do you think Leon was protecting Ashaki?”

“Yes. That’s the only thing that makes sense to me. I got the kill order as soon as we got back from Nazari’s. Zane’s right, he had eyes and ears on me. He knew what we saw and we’d figured out the woman was not his daughter.”

“One problem with that, Doll. The man you shot mentioned the prince.”

“Not if Leon sold us out completely and told Al Issa we were in the area. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Why not let Al Issa do his dirty work?”

Fuck. That made sense. Especially the part about Leon Brown selling us out to Al Issa.

“Doll, as much as I want to lie you out and make love to you, I think we need to wake the guys and tell them what you just told me. If Al Issa knows we’re coming for him, we need to shift our mission.”

“I know.”

She started to roll away but I held her tight. “One more thing. You make a decision about staying with the team?”