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He shrugged. “You wanted to throw yourself out of a car. What else could I do?”
“Anything but drug me, asshole.” I glanced around, guilty that I’d cursed again, but Ben was still in the laundry room.
“I’ll remember that for next time.” He smirked. The fucking assholesmirked. I wanted to kill him. I wanted to punch his smirky fucking face, and yeah, as soon as my hands worked properly, that was what I was going to do. But for now, I would listen.
“Tell. Me. Everything.”
“Okay, so I was born in ninety-two—”
“Don’t f—mess with me.”
He held up his hands. “trying to lighten things.”
“This isn’t a joke, Ethan.”
He nodded, then, as quick as I could blink, his expression changed—became something much darker. “Someone is trafficking kids, and fuck Josh, you’re right in the middle of it.”
ChapterTen
Ethan
I should have spent moretime planning a way to tell Josh what was happening. He was so white with shock, his gaze fixed past me and on the door his son had walked through. I tried to stop him, even gripping his arm, but he shook me off and stalked out of the room and right into where Ben and Oreo were. After a few moments of pause, I followed and stopped dead in the doorway. Josh was on the floor, his back to a tumble drier, Ben in his arms, and Oreo in Ben’s hold. The three of them were hugging, and I couldn’t see Josh’s face, but I didn’t have to see him to know he was probably in shock.
I meant to explain that Ben was okay—that no one had touched Ben—that he’d been the recipient of Rouxier’s affection in other ways. Ben had been spoiled, as Rouxier bought his way into Josh’s ex-wife’s affections, with trips to Disney, gifts, and presents that told anyone who saw them that Rouxier was rich, and that Josh’s ex and her son should feel lucky. I backed out of the room and shut the door behind me, so he might not even know I’d followed him in, and then I sat at the counter.
“Coffee?” someone asked from behind me, and I nearly hit the ceiling in fright. Some agent I was if a gentle offer of caffeine surprised me. Yet again, wanting to care for Josh left me vulnerable, and I had to harden myself to this before I messed up big time. “Jumpy much?” Kayden muttered as he crossed to the cupboard and rummaged for mugs. “Feeling guilty?”
“What? No, of course not.”
Something about Kayden made me wary. When I watched him with the other Sanctuary operatives, he was snarky, irreverent, and annoying, but a core of intensity contradicted his sarcasm. He wasn’t a person to suffer fools gladly, and he was the perfect man to be on my side against whoever was out there stealing kids and…
I couldn’t even think about some of the images I’d seen.
I hated they were even in my brain.
I was glad I’d seen them because I knew I wouldn’t stop until I took the whole thing down.
But then, why did I mess up with Josh? I’d put myself out there as someone who could pull a skin job and get me fucking Josh—every wild, loud, fuckingsecondof it—on camera. That was supposed to ingratiate me with Rouxier, and what had I done? Fucking fucked up, that was what I’d done.
“You’re second-guessing yourself,” Kayden pointed out as he handed me a mug and settled back to lean against the cabinet. “Beckett does that all the time.”
“Beckett?” I glanced around, expecting yet another Sanctuary operative to be walking into the room.
“Oh, he’s not here. He’s not one of us; Beckett’s my husband. Sexy as fuck and all mine.” He held up his left hand and waggled his fingers to draw attention to the platinum ring.
“Uh huh,” was about all I could manage.
Kayden eyed me with speculation, then placed his coffee on the counter next to mine and leaned in to talk to me. He wasn’t entirely in my personal space, but he was very close, which was unnerving.
“You’re regretting that you fucked up?” Kayden asked, as if he was talking about my thoughts on the weather—as if he hadn’t yanked the elephant from the corner of the room.
“What? No.” I lied.
“But youdidfuck up when you didn’t follow through on the whole fucking and filming thing, right?”
At that moment, I wanted to punch Kayden in the face. I didn’t. “That’s not exactly—”
“You fucked up, and now you regret it.”
