AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He let out a sharp sigh. “Until today, I was still unsure if maybe, you could be, well…bait. In a trap. Set for me.”
My jaw dropped. “Me? After fucking all those guys up in that elevator? Really?”
“It was improbable, yes. But so are you,” he said. “It was just too strange that the beautiful blonde secretary would leap into action out of nowhere, and defend me like a berserker warrior. Fight at my side. Earn my gratitude, spark my lust, pique my curiosity. It’s as if, you were specifically designed to be irresistible to me.”
I just stared at him, unable to decide between being gratified or furious. “So, what you’re saying is, you weren’t sure if I was a lying, murdering honeytrap whore, but you banged me anyway. Wow, Masters. That’s brave of you.”
“It’s not that I thought you were,” he corrected. “It was just a tiny percentage point of doubt. I had to put it to rest, because you’re amazing, and I want to fling myself into this thing one hundred percent, not ninety-nine. So, I tried to see if your life seemed, you know. Real. Genuine. If it held up to scrutiny.”
“And does it?”
“It’s strange,” he admitted. “You are clearly an unusual person. But your friends love you and trust you, and feel protective of you. It’s plain you take care of them, and that can’t be faked. So please. Accept my apology for violating your privacy.”
Hmmm. I reached out for a tempura-battered artichoke heart, and studied him while I slowly savored it. He waited patiently for my verdict.
“You’re throwing your weight around, big time, Masters,” I told him, grabbing another artichoke chunk. They were addictive as hell.
“Yes, my sister scolds me about that. Am I forgiven?”
“Not so fast, big guy,” I said. “‘Forgiven’ is a big word. It’s too soon. But in the meantime, you might as well catch me up on everything else you learned today.”
Ethan served me some ravioli. “I’ll give you the short version,” he said. “Clemens is nowhere to be found. He’s not at his house, or his office. I talked to Julia, his office manager. My sense is she only knew enough about what was going on to feel nervous, but that’s all.”
“Screw Julia,” I said coolly. “She used me, and threw me to the wolves, no matter what she knew or didn’t know. How about the office building? Did anyone report what happened to the police?”
“Oddly enough, no. No one called them.”
“No one? For a shootout?” I said, incredulously. “For real?”
“These people planned ahead,” he said. “The building is new, very few tenants so far, and that day, the security staff was out sick with a violent stomach bug. The guy who staffs the place ended up unconscious in the emergency room, and he claims nobody ever called anyone to cover. The guys who attacked us just showed up and took over, smooth as silk.”
“Wild,” I murmured, impressed. “That is some serious organization.”
“Yeah. The video disappeared, of course. The building was prepared for us. Or I suppose I should say, that building was prepared for me.”
I was inclined to think he was right. This was about him, not me. It didn’t feel like Tony Petruzzi’s style. Tony wasn’t big on guile, foresight, or planning. He wasn’t smart enough. He was just a bundle of raw, screaming nerve-endings with a gun.
“Another thing,” he said. “I also discovered that some people, not my people, showed up at your martial arts school looking for you. People that Danica did not like.”
I winced, inwardly. Chances were, those guys were Ethan’s baddies, but I wish I could be sure they weren’t connected to the Petruzzis. Because if they were, I needed to pack up my stuff, take my tiny stash of money, and scram. And I didn’t want to.
I would hate to leave my friends, and my girls. I’d broken rule number one and gotten attached. Then I met Ethan Masters, and proceeded to break rules two through two thousand. “That’s not good news,” I said.
He nodded, and we were quiet, concentrating on that incredible pasta for a few minutes while I groped around for a good starting place. I needed to say my piece.
“I hope you’ve concluded that I am not a whoring spy,” I told him. “That’s the antithesis of who I am.”
“I believe you,” he said. “One hundred percent.”
Something deep inside me relaxed. “Thank God.”
“That does not, however, explain the incredible strangeness of finding a woman with your reflexes and abilities and training standing next to me in that elevator.”
I shrugged. “Random fate. All I know about your problems is what you told me. You could keep me here for years and never get any useful info from me. I got zip.”
“Okay,”’ he said, as he refreshed my wine. “Tell me about your combat skills. How the hell did that happen?”
I was prepared for this question. I’d fielded it before, in other contexts, so I trotted out my standard story. “It started with a thing that happened in college,” I said. “I went to this frat party, which was my first mistake. I drank a cup of fruit punch, which was my second. I woke up with a guy trying to drag my pants off. I kneed him in the teeth. He needed dental work afterward. And I was glad of it. And I decided to invest a whole lot of energy into making sure nothing like that would ever happen to me again.”
