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That was the B-Squad. They protected their own, even if the person in question had only recently joined their ranks.
Isaac turned onto the road leading to the Devil's Dip Gym building. It was half a city block big and held a below-ground secured parking garage, Taz's boxing gym on the main floor, and apartments for most of the team and the B-Squad headquarters. "Anything else I need to know?"
"Tons." Marko didn't elaborate.
Good thing Isaac didn't expect him to. "Good talk, Mr. Chatty."
"Fuck you." The line went dead.
"I've never heard Marko talk that much and I see him almost every day," Tamara said.
Isaac winked at her. "He likes me."
He pulled to a stop next to the keypad that would open the Devil's Dip Gym’s private garage and entered his code and put his thumb against the fingerprint scanner. After a short beep, the garage door rolled up. Inside it was like a car fanatics' wet dream. If there was a high-end, tricked-out vehicle on the market—or about to enter it—the men and women of the B-Squad had it. It wasn't a cherry custom paint job or the enviable chrome work that identified what had to be Tamara's car. It was the beige, slightly dented ordinariness of it.
"A Camry?"
She shrugged. "I paid for it in cash and it gets the job done."
Taking in her designer dress that had a few well-repaired frays, he figured the past few months had been the first time in her adult life she'd had to settle for something that just 'got the job done.' He parked behind it, blocking her car in, then put his hand down on her seatbelt latch and covered it so she couldn't unbuckle.
He'd sit here all night like this if he had to but there was no way he could let her go back to that house until Wolczyk had moved on to search greener cases. The fact that Fane had called in a local, and not a very good one, as opposed to sending his own minions meant there might be hope that he thought finding Essie or Tamara in Fort Worth was a long shot.
"You can't go home tonight. If Wolczyk found you at the party, he could still show up at your house."
The stubborn tilt of her jaw said she wanted to argue and he braced himself.
"Fine," she said, obviously not happy about it. "I'll stay here."
Stubborn but not reckless. Now that was a mark in her favor. Not to mention smart. As far as crash pads went, she could do a helluva lot worse than a building that made Fort Knox look like an open house. Getting into the training gym was easy. Accessing any other part of the building without a key code and the right biometrics? Practically impossible. Plus, it was roomy as hell. When she'd designed her company headquarters, Bianca had made sure to keep a few rooms open for the occasional willing and not so willing overnight guest, so there was definitely space.
"You want me to take you home so you can grab some stuff?" he asked.
She gave him that fake beauty queen smile again. Either she knew it pushed him off kilter and liked d
oing it or she didn't give a fuck what it did to him. Even odds on either possibility.
"That's okay, I have a go-bag in my car." She snuck her fingers underneath his, sending a shock of electricity straight to his cock, then pressed the seatbelt latch release.
"Always prepared, huh?"
"You know us beauty queens." She opened the passenger door and stepped out onto the running board and then hopped off. "We need to be ready for any possibility."
He was out of his door in a flash and standing between her and the trunk of her car so nondescript it should belong to the Feds. "Like the Marines, just prettier and without the combat?"
"Oh honey, you've obviously never been backstage." She used her key fob to pop the trunk.
"Got rough did it?" The image of Tamara in her underwear and a white satin Miss Idaho sash in the middle of an all-female pillow fight flashed in his head.
Reaching around him, she snagged a hot pink duffle with a designer name stitched across the top from the trunk. "You do not want to know the damage boob tape or a few drops of sour flavoring in Vaseline can do."
"Vaseline?" He shut the trunk for her.
"You wear it to keep lipstick from getting on your teeth. If it tasted gross, you were stuck with that for the entire competition."
Now that was devious. "I think I'm starting to like you."
"You already did." She swapped her bag from her left to her right hand and shook out the fingers on her free hand and sat back against the closed trunk.
