Page 73 of Keeping Collette

“I’m not sure that would be the way to go,” Ox said. “But I can’t help feeling the longer we wait, the more the chance of them leaving increases.”

Julian abruptly stood, collecting up his leather binder. “I just remembered an important meeting I have to go to, but if there happens to be some discussion about a raid on a certain location after I’m gone, I don’t have an issue with that as I won’t know anything about it so can plead plausible deniability. After all, I did tell you all to stand down and wait for approval before moving in.”

Deal smiled; he may have given the other man a hard time, but Julian had proved himself over and over, and he was one of the good ones.

“Right. Sorry that you have to go so soon, Julian,” Ox said, with a wry grin.

Once the door shut behind the agent, Ox tapped the tablet in front of him. Cass was out that day because she wasn’t feeling well with her pregnancy, and Irish had insisted she stay home while he watched over her. More like hovering if the truth be known. The former Delta had turned extra protective over his wife, now that she was pregnant.

Would he be like that with Collette?

The thought pulled him up short. During the past two weeks, his feelings for Collette had only deepened, and he couldn’t imagine a life without her.

Tonight, when he got to her place, he would remind her of how he felt.

“Deal, you with us?” Ox asked, pulling him back to the present.

“Sorry, yeah.” He turned his attention to the screen where it was split into four. One showed real time footage of the warehouse. The second was the schematics of the building, so they could work out their entry and exit points. The third showed heat signatures of the people inside the warehouse. And the fourth was a map of the area showing the roads surrounding the building. They would need to plan how to get there without detection.

They were going against FBI orders, and it could fuck up their agreement with the organization, but there were too many lives about to be changed forever for anyone in the room to care about.

As Deal exited his vehicle in front of Collette’s building, the hairs on the back of his neck rose, and he went on alert. He scanned the area, but couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. There were no suspicious looking vehicles in the vicinity. He’d gotten familiar with the ones that tended to park around the building during the past two weeks.

He was practically living at Collette’s now, and he wasn’t sad about that. He may have thought he preferred her at his place, but he’d been wrong. There was more life and energy in her apartment than there ever had been in his.

Deciding a little walk up and down the street wasn’t out of place, Deal locked his car and slung his messenger bag across his body. It contained his laptop and tablet. Collette had seen him carrying his devices out the door one morning under his arm, and when he’d gotten home, she’d presented him with the bag. It wasn’t something he’d considered using in the past, but as it was a gift from her, he wasn’t going to not use it. He made sure the strap wasn’t inhibiting his ability to get to his firearm should he need to.

As he made his way down the sidewalk opposite to Collette’s, the feeling of unease began to settle. No cars had pulled away from the curb, so it wasn’t as though someone was running scared about being caught.

He crossed over and headed back in the other direction, toward the entrance to Collette’s building. By the time he reached it, he hadn’t found a reason for why his instincts started screaming at him. But he wasn’t going to ignore it either. His intuition had prodded him to be on alert.

It could be because of what they were about to do the next evening when they raided the warehouse. Before he shipped out, when he’d been a SEAL, he always got a little on edge, as if his body was prepping him for the adrenaline rush that was going to sit with him from the moment he got on the transport, until the day the transport landed back in the United States.

Satisfied that there was no danger and Collette wasn’t at risk, he entered the building and made his way to the elevator. As he stepped into the cart, his phone beeped, and he pulled it out of his pocket. A message from Cass flashed up on his screen.

Finished my deep dive into the guy that hit Collette. Couldn’t find any connection to Craig Onslow or Hound’s brother and cousin. Same with the cartels in the area and Viktor. Looks like it was a case of a guy high on drugs and alcohol getting behind the wheel when he shouldn’t.

Deal pocketed the phone as the doors opened on Collette’s floor, relieved that there’d been nothing sinister about Collette’s accident, the timing of it had been so coincidental to after they found Courtney’s body, that he’d been concerned.

But it looked like he worried unnecessarily. He could at least put that theory to bed. He trusted Cass would’ve checked everything possible to see if there was any sort of connection, no matter how tenuous it may have been.

He wouldn’t tell Collette what he’d done. She didn’t need to know. The accident had been traumatic enough as it was. Nothing good would come of reminding her of it.

As he opened the door, he was greeted, once again, with a delicious aroma. It was welcoming and warm, and he loved coming home to it.

“Hi honey, I’m home,” he called out and laughed, pulling off his bag and putting it on the hall table.

“Sweetheart, here’s you’re pipe and slippers. I’m sure you’ve had a terribly busy day.” Collette waltzed out of the kitchen, holding the imaginary items.

“Fuck, I love you.” The words exploded out of him. It wasn’t the first time he’d said them, but there was more feeling behind them now. He closed the gap between them and cupped her cheek, needing to say them again. “I love you. I love coming home to you every day. I love the way you join in with my jokes.”

“Oh, Kayce,” she murmured, her gaze shining with happiness. “I love you, too. You are the best part of my day. I can’t imagine you not being in my life.”

Deal leaned forward and captured her lips with his. The kiss was soft and was different from every kiss they’d shared, because of what they’d just said. How they both acknowledged their love for each other was all encompassing.

He adjusted his stance so he could wrap his arms around her and hold her tight against him. He never wanted to let her go. A feeling he never thought he’d experience.

Now he understood how everyone of his friends felt when they found the one woman who completed them. Who filled the empty places that they weren’t aware existed.