I stand outside of Regan's door for the next ten minutes. I don't say anything. I can't. There isn't anything I can do to change the monumental fuck up I just made, so why bother? I have no excuse for the jealousy card I played except that this is foreign to me — all of it.
That possessive, narcissistic asshole I portrayed in the elevator isn’t me. There's just something about Regan that brings out my chauvinistic side. Just the thought of her with Isaac. . . Ugh! My blood boils just thinking about it.
I told myself she was stirring me, that she wanted me to react to her taunts, but no matter how many times common sense screamed at me that I was a better man, I didn’t hear a fucking word he spoke.
I wanted to piss a circle around Regan to mark my territory. I wanted to fuck her so hard, my name would ring in Isaac’s ears for years to come, but one confession unraveled it all.
Isaac lives in this building. His apartment is the one sitting opposite Regan’s, so you can be assured any surveillance equipment in this hallway was infiltrated by the FBI the instant Isaac was placed on their radar.
That means they have our kiss on camera. If that isn’t bad enough, they may even have glimpses of Regan’s bare breast. It’s probably only a bit of cleavage, but that alone has my legs pumping as fast as my heart.
I charge down the corridor before throwing open the emergency exit door next to the elevator bank. The shoes Regan despised batter the stairs as hard as my heart smashes against my ribs. I take the stairs two at a time, my focus on one thing and one thing only—protecting Regan.
By the time I make it onto the sidewalk outside Regan’s building, only half a lung is in operation, but a new record-setting pace has been achieved. As my lungs work through their oxygen deprivation, I scan the congested street. In a town as bustling as Ravenshoe, even the Bureau has issues finding parking spots.
I find what I’m looking for half a block down. The faded pizza sign on a dark blue van makes it appear authentic, but the lack of movement on a Friday night assures me it's the vehicle I’m seeking.
When I throw open the unlocked door of the van a few seconds later, a man I’d guess to be early to mid-twenties startles. He has the same blond hair as me, a similar wonky smile, but his shoulders are two sizes smaller than mine and his personality a whole lot more timid.
“Move,” I instruct, shoving him away from the bank of monitors he's seated in front of.
It takes me flashing him my ID before he does as instructed. If my endeavor to remove Regan from the FBI’s surveillance mainframe weren’t my utmost priority, I’d commend his commitment to the job. Not many tech agents come out of the gates firing. Most wilt away within the first six months on the job. The fact he didn’t flinch when given a direct order has me curious about how long he’s been on the job, and why he requested to be a technician instead of an agent.
When he eyes me with suspicion, I add to my ruse, “We got word our target is piggy-backing off our surveillance. I need to check the servers to ensure they’re clear.”
I'm talking nonsense. I'm a field agent for a reason. This technical mumbo jumbo isn't my field of expertise. Fortunately for me, I only need to know one button to fulfill my goal: the delete button.
“That can’t be right. I coded this program myself. It's unhackable,” the young technician assures, his voice more confident than his facial expression.
“Is that so?”
When he nods, I add on, “Then what's this? Why is our target visiting her now?”
I point to a monitor on my left that shows Isaac knocking on Regan's apartment door—the same door I pinned her to with my cock as I assaulted her mouth with my tongue.
Our kiss—fuck. How can you describe something you’ve never experienced before? I’ve kissed plenty of women, but I’ve never had an all-encompassing, I’ll never seek release without it entering my thoughts kiss before.
The fact I’m thinking this way after nothing but a kiss proves the power Regan has over me. I don’t just want to break the rules for her. I want to rewrite them.
I’m snapped from my dangerous thoughts when the technician mumbles, “He could be borrowing a cup of sugar?”
He laughs, apparently amused. I’m glad he can find humor in our situation. I am anything but amused. I left Regan in a . . . vulnerable state. The last thing I want is Isaac relieving her of her predicament.
“Listen. . .” I read the technician’s name off his ID badge, “. . .Brandon. I’ve been running this operative from the ground the past four months. Isaac doesn’t borrow sugar. I kissed a member of his team to see if he would react. He’s reacting.”
“Your kiss was staged?”
My chest puffs high from the shock in Brandon’s tone. He either thinks I’m a brilliant actor or full of shit. Praying it's the former, I continue to pull the wool over his eyes, “Yes. You’ve met our head of unit, right?”
He nods before his hand darts up to tug at the collar of his polo shirt. It’s not hot. The temperature inside the van is sitting at a pleasant 74˚F. He’s merely responding how every rookie agent does when they meet the very definition of a ball crusher.
“So you’re well aware Theresa demands her agents to go above and beyond the norm, right?”
Looking a little ill, Brandon nods again.
“That’s why I kissed Rae. I was following orders.”
“Rae?” Brandon double-checks, somewhat confused.
I curse under my breath before stammering out, “Rae, Regan. What’s one blonde to another?” I backhand his chest, acting like an Grade A moron. “We should call them all ‘babe’ to save the awkwardness in the morning when you can’t remember their names.” I laugh, ending my chauvinist routine worthy of an Oscar nomination.
In the corner of my eye, I spot Isaac walking away from Regan’s unopened apartment door. When he enters an empty elevator car a few seconds later, a sense of relief washes through me. Not enough I forget my original campaign, but enough to unclench my jaw.
“Pass me a pen. We should be jotting this down so we can forward it to Theresa for analysis.” I’m referring to Isaac’s movements—not my kiss with Regan. I gesture to a stack of pens on Brandon’s far right, purposely knocking his mug of coffee onto the box responsible for backing up surveillance images.
“Ah, fuck. Jesus. What did I do?” I grab the wad of napkins under his half-eaten donut to soak up the mess sprayed across his keyboard while he frantically strives to save the mainframe from fritzing.
Confident he's distracted, I remove any traces of my exchange with Regan from the startup system before it’s transferred to the mainframe.
When it's all said and done, I feel no less guilty. I expected a weight to lift off my chest the instant I removed Regan from Theresa’s vindictive strike. All I get is more worry.
This is wrong. I am a federal agent. I don’t destroy evidence. I gather it to charge criminals and protect the innocent.
I guess I could use that as the reason why I’ve allowed Regan to misalign my moral compass twice in my career. She’s an innocent caught up in a game she doesn’t belong in.
Even with a shattered kneecap, I followed the Substanz case with an eagle eye. What Regan said that night was true. There was no evidence whatsoever that she was part of the illegal brothel operating as a side business from Substanz. She was purely a dancer—a good one.
Who’s to say that isn’t the case this time around as well? Perhaps she's just Isaac’s business lawyer. The corrupt are known for surrounding themselves with honesty. It’s how they fly under the radar so long. No one scans their own backyards for criminals.
When I slump into my chair, perplexed, a note scribbled on Isaac’s movement sheet captures my attention.
Electrician arrived at the apartment across from target at 9:16 PM. Departure time:
No departure time has been noted. I drop my eyes to my watch, noticing it's a few minutes short of 11 PM.
“Why didn’t you jot down a departure time for the serviceman? Although we no longer have agents allocated to Isaac’s team, we still track their movements like we do Isaac’s. Every breadcrumb must be noted.”
Brandon dumps coffee-soiled papers into a bin with a grumble before twisting around to face me. His eyes are narrowed, and his lips are hard-lined. He’s peeved. Rightly so. One swipe of my hand ruined hours of surveillance while adding more work to his already tight schedule. Lucky for all involved, Isaac’s routine rarely alters. A quick copy and paste of yesterday stats will cover my “mishap.”
After dropping his eyes to the note I am referring to, Brandon returns them to me. “He hasn’t left yet.”
My brow cocks, certain I heard him wrong.
I didn’t.
“It must have been a private callout—he entered the apartment unattended. Usually, the front desk has someone escort them.”
He rifles through a pile of handwritten notes, oblivious to my bubbling anger. I don’t know why I am angry, but with no other plausible explanation for my skyrocketing blood pressure and reddening cheeks, I’ll assume it's anger.
“I requested the guest registry the instant he entered the apartment. I have it here somewhere.” Just as I am about to rip the papers out of Brandon’s hands to search them myself, he murmurs, “Here it is.”
Paper shredding booms over his whiny voice when I snatch the document from his grasp. My jaw ticks as I scan the extensive guest registry. Unease invades my gut when I reach 9 PM. There are only four names jotted down between then and now. None of them are for an electrical company.
“Are you sure it was an electrician you saw?” I ask Brandon, my voice picking up with unconcealed suspicion. It has the same cocky edge it held when I interrogated Regan about her supposed after dinner date.
Brandon’s throat works hard to swallow. “Yeah. I’m fairly sure—”
“Fairly sure? Or one hundred percent sure?” My tone advises I will not accept a pansy-ass reply. We don’t run on assumptions here. We work with facts—stern, unapologetic facts.
“I’m confident.” His voice doesn’t relay this. “He had an electrician logo on the back of his overalls.”
Leaning over my body, he taps on the keyboard three times. It brings up the image responsible for my panic. At precisely 9:16 PM a man approximately five foot eight with light sandy hair and a dark cap glides down the corridor separating Regan’s apartment from Isaac’s. As Brandon advised, there's an electric company logo emblazoned on the back of his overalls.
Although he's carrying a large metal toolbox, the veins in his hand aren’t showing the exertion you’d expect if it were brimming with tools. Come to think of it, his hands are dainty and smooth—unlike any tradesmen I’ve seen.
“Run his company through the system. We can track his movements from there,” I suggest to Brandon, hoping his knowledge of the FBI database is more extensive than mine.
It doesn’t even take Brandon thirty seconds to run the electrician’s details through our system. It isn’t because he’s brilliant at what he does. It's because the search comes up empty. There's no company of that name in the world database, much less the state of Florida.
I swallow away a bitter taste in the back of my throat. “Are you sure you didn’t miss his exit?”
You can hear desperation in my voice. Regan entered her apartment twenty minutes ago. Isaac knocked and didn’t get an answer. That hasn’t happened once the past four months I’ve been tailing them. This can only mean one thing: Regan is being stalked as she presumed months ago.
When Brandon remains quiet, I growl, “Did you take a break? A piss? Fall asleep? At any time tonight were you away from these monitors?”
When Brandon shakes his head at each of my suggestions, I leap to my feet. “Where's your service weapon?” I throw open compartments surrounding his computer station before half my sentence leaves my mouth. I need to get to Regan, and I need to get to her now.
Brandon shocks me by removing his gun from a holster on his waist. Standard technicians don't carry their guns like normal agents. Some don't even have government-assigned weapons. Realizing now isn’t the time to discuss semantics, I check that Brandon’s weapon is loaded before hightailing it out of his van.
“What do you want me to do?!” Brandon shouts, slowing my steps down the still-bustling sidewalk.
A few of my fancy-dressed sidewalk companions balk when I reply, “Maintain surveillance. If you hear gunfire, call in back up.”
I should be advising him to summon back up now, but since I don’t want Regan to discover my secret life with a circus act in tow, I’ll go in alone. I’m armed and confused—a lethal combination in itself. The electrician better hope Brandon failed to notice his departure, or he's in for one hell of a fright.
I thought fleeing Regan’s apartment building would be the only record I’d smash tonight. My return is just as dramatic. I’m sprinting down the corridor of Regan’s floor with forty seconds still under my belt.
“Rae!?” I bang on the gleaming white door of Regan’s apartment. “I know you’re pissed, and I’m more than happy to take an ear bashing, but you need to open the door first.”
Whoever said “silence is a good answer” is a moron. I’d give anything to hear Regan’s voice right now. I’d even hand in my badge.
I press my ear against her door, praying she’s just being stubborn.
I can’t hear a fucking thing.
“Rae?! If you don’t open the door, I’ll kick it down.” My low tone indicates the honesty in my threat.
Silence—I get nothing but heart-clenching silence.
Recalling the cautionary countdown Regan did on me months ago, I growl, “Five. . . Four. . . Three . . .”
I don’t make it to two. I’m too fucking impatient.
After taking a step back, I rear up my leg and kick at the lock on her door. The thick white material is sturdy, but it has nothing on my determination. It pops open nicely under my boot, the safety latch coming away just as easily.
“Rae.” I enter her apartment with my gun held high and my heart rate out of control.
It marginally settles when I fail to spot any ruckus upon entry. Usually, if you are attacked unaware, it happens during entry. Regan’s keys and purse are resting on an antique table on my right, and her shoes are kicked off halfway down the elongated foyer.
Earthy tones of blue bombard me when I enter her massive living room. Regan’s apartment spans one half of the top floor of Hector. I love space, but it comes at a cost. An impressive eyesore is a bitch to keep clean, much less sweep for a suspected intruder.
Confident the triple-sized living area is empty, I direct my focus to the left. Although I’ve never been inside Regan’s apartment, her floorplan appears to be an exact replica of Isaac’s—it’s just mirror-reversed.
“Rae?” A faint hum jingles through my ears. I’m shocked I can hear anything with how hard my pulse is thrumming through my body. I feel like I’m trapped underwater, submerged by worry.
When another groan filters through my ears, I quicken my pace. It was a moan laced with painful frustration.
After sweeping a guest bedroom on my right, I continue down the hall. I know which room is Regan’s as it has a light beaming through a partially cracked open door.
“Rae?” I call out again, praying she's alone, but petrified of scaring her. “Are you in here?”
The door creaks when I push it open. No signs of human life are seen or heard. Her bedroom is a similar palette to her living room, although I don’t have time to admire it. A tormented scream shreds my eardrums. It's closely followed by a loud bang.
I charge for the door the noise bellowed through, my steps as hurried as my heart rate. Although her bathroom door could be unlocked, it suffers the same fate as Regan’s front door. It buckles under the force of my foot, its elegant design wiped in an instant.
With my finger curled around the trigger of Brandon’s gun, I merge deeper into the steam-filled space. The fact Regan neglected to voice anger at the demolition of her door has me worried. That isn’t something she’d take sitting down. She’d be up in my face, demanding immediate repair.
I understand why she’s not complaining when an image breaks through the fog surrounding me. Regan isn’t being held captive by a gun-toting swindler with a death wish. She’s taking a bath. The earbuds lodged in her ears have music pumping through her veins as rapidly as her bubble-covered skin has blood pumping to my cock.
Although the image of her unharmed cools my turbines, it doesn’t completely quell my worry. The steam vaping from the scorching hot water adds a whole new dimension to my unease.
Forgetting Regan has noise-cancelling instruments wedged in her ears, I demand, “Rae, get out of the bath.”
When she remains in place, humming a tune, I tug an earphone out of her ear before repeating my request. Wish for my own noise-cancelling headphones engulfs me when Regan screams blue murder. She darts out of the tub, the slippery oils coating her skin not hampering her efforts in the slightest.
Though she’s issuing me every death threat I’ve been given the past six years in under a minute, I snag a fluffy towel off the towel rack and hand it to her. Usually, it would be the fight of my life to keep my eyes off her naked frame, but since I can’t remove my eyes from the death threat messily scrawled across her large vanity mirror, the fight isn’t as torturous.
“What the hell?” Regan murmurs, finally spotting the cause of my concern. “Who did that?” She tugs her towel close to her body as if it will protect her more than my gun.
I start my interrogation like always, “Did you notice anything out of place when you arrived home tonight? Missing articles of clothing? The TV turned on when it should be off?”
Regan shakes her head, her eyes unable to leave the threat guaranteeing brutal mutilation of her body. I step into the path of her vision, blocking the horrifying words from her view. When I’m given the devotion of her wide-with-terror eyes, I ask, “Has anything like this happened before?”
She shakes her head once more, its juddering as violent as the shake of her hands.
“It’s okay,” I assure her, my tone calm even though I’m feeling anything but. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”
She accepts my pledge more quickly than I expected. It's probably more because of the fear enveloping her than blind faith.
I stop removing my cellphone from my pocket when Regan garbles my name. My eyes jackknife to hers, stunned by the sheer terror radiating in her voice when she asks, “Did you arrive with company?”
Before I can respond, a flurry of black captures my attention. Someone is darting away from the door I just kicked in.
“Stay here,” I demand of Regan before taking off after a shadow. They were so quick, I didn’t register any details of their face, much less what they’re wearing.
When I enter Regan’s living room, I head to the right, the groan of someone crashing into a firm surface directing my steps. As expected, the assailant is hightailing it down the corridor of Regan’s apartment building. He's wearing the same overalls Brandon mentioned during surveillance, but the straps have been undone, exposing a spotlessly clean wife beater shirt.
“Stop or I’ll shoot,” I warn, lining up my target from the doorway of Regan’s apartment.
He tests my patience by continuing down the hall. He shouldn’t. This is the first time I’ve mixed business with pleasure, and I don’t see it ending well. He was conspiring to hurt Rae. If his threat is anything to go by—badly!
“Fuck!” I curse when he throws open a laundry chute halfway down the hall and dives inside. Because of his svelte frame, he fits through the trap door with ease.
I nearly fire off a shot, but years of experience tell me my effort will be too late. While charging for the emergency stairwell, I raise my hand to my ear. Because I’m so accustomed to being on the job, it takes me several long seconds to recall why I don’t have access to my usual equipment. My feet stomp faster when I realize I don’t have the ability to radio in assistance.
Just as I throw open the fire exit door next to the elevator bank, Brandon barrels into the corridor. He's wheezing and out of breath. “Assailant. On. Camera. Saw. Him. Re-enter.” He breathes deeply through each word, showcasing why he's a technician instead of a field agent. He’s extremely unfit.
“Where do the laundry chutes exit?” The hammering of my heart echoes in my tone. It’s not racing a million miles an hour because I am weak like Brandon; it's the fear enveloping me responsible for its frantic beat.
Brandon attempts to speak through his pain. “B. . bas—”
“Basement,” I fill in, hurrying him along.
When he nods, I demand, “Send a crew to the basement before calling in forensics. I doubt he left any evidence, but we won’t know if we don’t check.”
Brandon peers at me as if I asked him how long his cock is.
“The basement, Brandon. Send men to the basement,” I repeat as if he's stupid.
“We don’t have any men,” he advises, “much less ones I can boss around.”
I wish he were lying. I wasn’t being deceitful when I said Theresa’s crew was sliced to a few men earlier this month.
“By the time either of us get to the basement, he’ll be long gone.” Brandon’s eyes drop to the ground, unsure how to voice his next set of words. I can understand his worry when he stammers out, “I also don’t think it’s wise to bring Theresa in on this. She’ll arrive with a truckload of questions—ones I’m certain you don’t want to answer.”
Although he's being honest, his words aren’t easy for me to stomach. I want the person responsible for the pain that tore at my chest when I spotted Regan’s death threat held accountable for his actions. I want to pound him as mercilessly as my heart is smashing into my ribs. He wants to hurt Regan, so you can be assured I will hurt him.
“Then what do you suggest I do, Brandon?” I articulate his name with a sneer, annoyed just at the prospect of seeking his advice. I don’t ask for advice, and definitely not from a man beneath me.
Shockingly, Brandon doesn’t balk at my threatening tone. His cheeks flush, but I’m certain that’s more from his marathon stair climb than my angry snarl.
“Do what you’ve been doing the past four months.”
I growl. This time he balks.
His throat works hard to swallow several times in a row before he mutters, “I mean run your own investigation. Theresa is bad news. You don’t want her or her crew on this.”
His reply stumps me. That isn’t something a standard technician would say. He’s more deeply involved in the Bureau than a standard techy. I just can’t fathom how?
Before half a notion can filter through my brain, a sweet voice interrupts it. Regan is calling my name. It isn’t the way I want to hear it shouted. She sounds scared.
Wanting to end one fight before taking up another, I instruct Brandon, “Remove the last ten minutes from the surveillance log and call in a disturbance. If Theresa believes the incident of the electrician’s failure to leave requires further investigation, let her men come in.”
“And if she wants to leave it alone?” Brandon asks, intuiting my thoughts.
“Then I’ll handle it.”
He nods, preferring our second solution.
I hand him back his gun, suddenly wishing I was armed twenty-four-seven. He takes it before pivoting on his heels and stalking away. While waiting for the elevator to arrive to Regan’s floor, he calls in a disturbance.
I wait for him to be given further instructions before shouting his name. When he turns around to face me, I say, “Although this investigation is taking a slight turn, I expect to see your report on my desk first thing Tuesday morning.”
He looks at me strangely, as if to say, you have a desk?
“Theresa may do things dodgy around here, but not all of us are like her,” I explain, hoping he’ll see sense through the madness. “We’re agents before we are anything.”
My last sentence doesn’t come out as strong as my first, probably because it was laced with dishonesty. I don’t know what I would have done if I had caught Regan’s assailant tonight. A dark, wet basement seems rather enticing right now, all the more so when Brandon’s exit coincides with Regan’s entrance.
Her towel has been replaced with a silky black negligee she’s thrown on in a hurry. The uneven hemline isn’t the only evidence of her quick dressing. The fact her negligee is inside out is another indication.
After scanning the corridor to ensure we are alone, Regan locks her eyes with mine. Her brows tack together as she clenches her fists into tiny balls. She’s not scared like I anticipated earlier. She's downright fuming mad.