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“Don’t get all proud of yourself,” Jase admonished. “Remember the poor bastard might have gotten a half day’s head start, but he had to carry a ninety-pound backpack.”

“Yeah well, I’ll still take the win,” Ryker grinned.

“Don’t be so sure it’s a win until we get one.”

2

Ryker knew it was stupid to try to track Zed at night when there wasn’t even much of a moon, that’s why they were camped out, but he was still antsy.

“Go to sleep already. I can hear you thinking from over here,” Jase murmured.

“You go to sleep,” Ryker retorted.

After that Jase left him alone and soon Ryker could hear his even breaths that indicated he was asleep.

Ryker’s mind wandered backward… of course, it did. He’d been doing nothing but thinking about Amy since he’d first seen her, but he’d been obsessing since their telephone calls. Talk about a connection. He snorted at his double entendre. At least he still had a sense of humor about things.

His dad had told all of his sons that they’d be like him, and he found out he was right. Every single one of the Ryker boys had gone out with a lot of women, but when they found the woman of their dreams, they were hooked. Game over. It was all she wrote.

Amy is it for me. He’d known he was a goner the first time he’d set eyes on her seven months ago.

His mind wandered back in time.

He hadn’t meant to objectify her, not even in his mind, but goddamn, she was sex-on-stilettos. Long, curly brown hair that almost hit her ass, she was a pocket Venus. When he first saw her winding her way toward his table, his tongue almost fell out of his mouth—she was the most gorgeous woman he’d ever seen in his life. Then she sat down with him, Kostya, and Kostya’s fiancée Lark, and things got better and better.

The woman was a pistol as soon as she opened her mouth. They’d been at the National Harbor Casino in Maryland to do a fluffy little undercover op for Lark. Kostya had decided that if Lark was bringing her best friend, she needed a ‘date’ and Ryker had volunteered. And he’d never been so glad that he’d volunteered for something in his life.

Now, flirting was his default setting, so as soon as Amy sat down the waitress came to take her order, and the woman must have asked Ryker if he wanted a refill or something, he had no idea what, because all of his attention was on Amy. Okay, not all, he might have laid it on really thick with the waitress and had her leaving the table with a big ole smile on her face.

As soon as the waitress left, Amy made some snarky comment about the waitress wanting to have his love child because he batted his eyelashes at her like a pretty boy. It had taken everything he had not to spit out his beer and roar with laughter.

Love child? Pretty boy? Eyelashes?

He looked over at his lieutenant for man-to-man support, but he was too busy laughing. As soon as he could keep a straight face, he reminded Amy that it was his duty to flirt.

“How do you figure?”

They’d been there on a mission to get information, so his job had been to flirt with the waitress and see if he could find out about a potential lead for Lark. Amy acknowledged he was right, but that didn’t stop her from flipping him more shit every time the waitress came back to the table and he flirted.

By the end of the night, he had trouble remembering the waitress’s name, but he could tell you exactly how many times Amy licked the sugar off the rim of her virgin lemondrop martini, because every time she did, he got aroused. Shit, aroused was too tame of a word, on fire was more like it. He used all those feelings to flirt with the waitress.

When the waitress suggested she and Ryker meet later, she finally acknowledged Amy, wanting to know if she were Ryker’s date.

“Oh no, he’s free as a bird. Nobody’s managed to saddle this bronc,” Amy cooed.

Again, it was hard to keep a straight face, especially when he heard Lark giggle.

The waitress was so not the woman he wanted to be meeting alone for drinks. After he promised the waitress to meet up, the four of them talked for a bit more at the bar, then left for dinner together. Ryker had been in heaven because that meant that Amy and he were seated together as a couple, and he totally played it up. Because hey...couple.

Kostya had picked a restaurant that was known for great food, and then the smart man had requested a booth! Ryker had immediately offered to put Lark’s purse on the other side of Amy because she was ‘so small.’ Amy had glared at him, but he didn’t care. It forced her to sit a little closer to him, and that was all that mattered.

“So how often do you pick up waitresses?” Amy asked sweetly as the calamari appetizer was served.

“As often as they fall down,” he answered.

Amy rolled her eyes.

“Did I tell you how much I like your outfit?”