The Animal Under The Fur Page 8

  Ploom told me to go easy on myself, that it still counts as a Complete because we got what we needed and more.

  Yeah, thanks to her.

  After my disappointing debrief with my team, the longest work out of my life, and a fitful night’s sleep, I came straight to my local bar, Uncorked. It’s attached to a swanky hotel on my block, and its dark lighting and worn wood is perfect for wanting to blend in and be left alone. Even if I don’t indulge myself with a stiff drink, I still find such establishments soothing. Well, sometimes. Thoughts of my parents’ deaths, the images of their mangled car, flash through my mind, and I swallow down a lump in my throat as Matt places my new beverage in front of me.

  Grunting my thanks, I take down half the glass. The liquid is cool and refreshing. Damn, how I wish this was filled with whiskey instead.

  Echoes of Jules gushing over Nashville’s records still play in my ear, and my resolve drops. I’m suddenly desperate to lean over and grab one of the bottles behind the bar.

  Jesus, get a hold of yourself.

  Instead I crunch the ice from my drink between my teeth.

  What I really need is a new assignment, anything to help remove this past one. Even with Eu-fùnh’s very skilled talents, I still found myself thinking of Nashville immediately afterward.

  Pfft.

  Nashville.

  What a name.

  Under different circumstances I might have found it cute, but there’s nothing cute in this situation. I just don’t understand why I’m still wasting mental energy on this chick. This isn’t like me. I let things go. Walk forward without looking back. Especially when it comes to women. But this is more than that. This is my reputation being messed with, and in my line of work, that’s all K-Ops have.

  When I pressed Ploom about why we didn’t have the same intelligence on Kam, he assured me he would look into it, but this is how the business goes. The sister companies are notorious for withholding information from one another, and some things get lost in the shuffle. I almost punched him in his muffin top when he said that. How can I trust my department, or any future assignment, if that’s the case?

  Taking another drag from my drink, I notice someone approaching from my left. Glancing over, I watch an attractive blonde slip onto the stool beside me.

  “Hi there,” she says with a flirty smile.

  I assess her bleached-blond hair instead of red, her tanned skin instead of milky white, and her dark-brown eyes instead of daylight blue.

  She’s perfect.

  “Hey.” I grin.

  We stumble into her hotel room, and she giggles when we knock over picture frames that line the walls. She tastes like the last tequila shot she took before telling me she had a room at the connecting hotel. Didn’t have to tell me twice, Kristy…or was it Misty?

  Pushing me against the other wall, she explores down my body while I feel up her thin frame to her breasts.

  Man, I’m so happy not to be thinking about someone else right now.

  Kristy or Misty takes off both our shirts before continuing to kiss me, moving us toward the bed.

  Because she really doesn’t deserve another minute of my time.

  Misty unbuckles my belt.

  I mean, it was too obvious she thought she was better than everyone with her A+ genes and Spider-Man moves.

  My pants hit the floor, freeing me, and Kristy moans with pleasure.

  I hope I never see that dragon-woman’s face again.

  Pushing me onto the sheets, Misty licks her way down my abs, and I lay my head back, taking in the white ceiling above.

  So empty.

  Blank.

  God, how I envy it.

  Warmness from Kristy’s mouth envelops me, and I suck in a breath, my mind finally zeroing in on what’s taking place.

  I tangle my fingers into Misty’s hair just as a shrill ringing of a phone fills the room.

  We both ignore it, Kristy’s attention occupied by bigger, more important things.

  The ringing continues.

  And continues.

  And continues.

  Goddammit.

  I glance around the room.

  Is that my cell?

  As soon as the buzzing stops, it starts up again.

  That’s definitely mine.

  I don’t know what causes me to stop what’s going on at this very moment, but I’m obviously not sane anymore, because I sit up and pull Kristy away from me. She whines as I roll off the bed to grab my pants. Fishing out my phone, I resist chucking it against the wall when I see the caller ID.

  “Ploom,” I answer with a growl, “what do you want now?”

  21

  3

  SI6 HEADQUARTERS

  CHICAGO, ILLINOIS: 0938 HOURS

  I can’t believe I’m walking through these doors. David promised I could get my vacation after the Hong Kong assignment, yet here I am, back at SI6 only a week after coming home from China. David caught me in a weird sense of déjà vu, as I was scrolling through vacation resorts this morning and saw his name pop up on my phone. Just like last time. Except this time, I really could use that vacation.

  It took me three days, running twenty-two miles, six hours at the gun range, five intense sessions with my combat trainer, two with my therapist, and a healthy dose of yelling at Axel and Akoni to rid myself of the anger I had from the tête-à-tête with COA operative Carter Smith. I’m a short-tempered person. I know it doesn’t take a lot to get on my nerves, and despite the rigorous meditation classes SI6 mandates I take, I’m a short fuse. But even with all this, no one has lingered in my heart’s hate box as long as this guy, and I barely met him.

  I even confided to Ceci, something I rarely do when it comes to work situations, but as soon as I got back, she knew something was up. I of course left out the part about us both being assigned to kill the same person, saying instead that we got the same client to investigate. After word vomiting for a good hour, Ceci looked at me with the biggest grin and told me she thinks my problem is that I finally met my match, someone who “can volley back what I serve,” as she put it. Basically, someone like her.

  I laughed so hard I peed a little.

  Ceci’s one thing, but if Carter and I are playing in the same game, I think it’s only too obvious who’s winning. Sure, he held his own in our small combative run-in, but in the end I killed the target, I got the DNA samples, and I finished my assignment—and his. What did he do? Fix his tux?

  That’s the only silver lining in all this, imagining him reporting back to his team. How did he explain what happened? How did he take getting an INCOMPLETE stamped on his folder? A grin slides onto my face. Yeah, call me vindictive or immature, but you don’t get a perfect record by being nice to your competitors. Especially if your competitors turn out to be your colleagues.

  But all that’s in the past now. I have emotionally and mentally rid myself of Carter Smith, Simon, Ben, The Bull. Whatever stupid name he wants to give himself. I will never see him again, and that fact right there allowed me to wake up this morning with a smile and look for vacation destinations. Now I just have to decline whatever assignment David thinks he’s giving me, get home, and finally, finally book this thing.

  “3!” Akoni jogs down the hall toward me, his broad shoulders pulling at his T-shirt, which has an image of a computer with the words I have a harder drive than you underneath.

  “Hey, Akoni, did you get called in for this thing with Axel too?”

  “Uh, yeah…I did.” We walk in step as we pass this floor’s open floor plan. It’s covered in neat rows of desks, where the newbie operatives sit. The more advanced associates and directors have offices that ring the second floor, with windows peering down into the pit—mob bosses looking at their factory floor.

  Hearing the unease in Akoni’s voice, I stop at the base of the ascending stairs. “What?”

  He glances around before asking, “Do you know why we’re talking with Axel today?”

  “No.” I pucker my
brows. “He didn’t elaborate on the phone. Why?”

  He scratches his bicep while pressing his lips together. “Well, whatever you do, just don’t blame me, okay?” And before I can answer, he takes the stairs up two at a time.

  “Akoni!” What has he done now? Letting out a frustrated huff, I continue my way to David’s, but as I reach the second-floor landing, I find myself hesitating when a light fragrance of cinnamon and male wafts under my nose. The scent is barely there, but it immediately raises the hairs on the back of my neck.

  Turning left, I peer down the hallway to my group director’s office, which rests at the end. Akoni slips in, past David Axel, who’s standing by the door, dressed in his usual black slacks and light-blue button-down, chatting to three strangers. My attention slides to a young blond woman, high bun in place, directly opposite him, and I quickly take in her profile. About five eight, late twenties, tan skin, quarter-sized birthmark under her right ear, and sharpened features that seem on a constant verge of slipping into an easy grin. Her white buttoned-down shirt and black pantsuit fits her perfectly, but from the way she stands with her legs slightly apart and one hand fluttering at her hip, as if searching for more to grab, I can tell she has a police background.

  An older gentleman is beside her and shares the same age as David, but that’s where the similarities stop. Where my group director is tall with a muscular build and broad shoulders, this man’s height is only an inch taller than myself, with a gut that hangs over his khaki pants, exposing his pleasure in never skipping the dessert menu. He skin has a pasty sheen from not getting enough vitamin D, and his hair is styled in the way of a newborn’s, barely there. He’s blocking another man sitting at the conference table, but as I draw closer, he shifts away, revealing the third stranger.

  I nearly trip over my feet as the blood rushes from my head and settles in a whirling motion of chaos in my chest.

  As if sensing someone watching, the man, who’s slouched comfortably back in his chair, moves his green gaze from David’s and locks on to mine. His body instantly tenses, and the same surprise washes over his features before it’s gone, replaced with his brows slamming down and his jaw tightening in silent fury.

  This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. THIS ISN’T HAPPENING.

  Carter, almost-ruin-my-mission-in-China, I-will-stab-him-in-the-eyes-with-thumbtacks, Smith sits a hundred feet away looking out at me from my group director’s office.

  In my agency.

  In my city.

  What. The. Fuuuuuck.

  22

  3

  SI6 HEADQUARTERS

  CHICAGO, ILLINOIS: 0940 HOURS

  The Rapture is about to pour out of me as I continue forward. I can practically feel it erupting from every cell to sweep through the room in an acid wash, peeling, burning, and gleefully devouring each person’s gurgling screams. As it leaps forward to take and claim, I’d hold it back from David though. I would pull on its chains, ordering it to heel as I’d walk over Carter’s melting corpse, not giving him a second glance, and make my way to Axel’s cowering body. I’d smile as his large form kneels and begs for mercy, taking in his words of remorse for his deception, for lying, tricking. I’d let him desperately babble, apologize, before laying a gentle hand to his cheek, shushing him, giving him a glimmer of hope, allowing him one tear of relief to fall, seeing my mercy right before I dropped the leash and let the devil shred him to pieces.

  The hallway snaps back into a focus as the last of my rage dream subsides, and I work hard to keep my face impassive as I step into David’s office. A large, sleek conference table stretches in front of me, parallel to the windowed wall to the left, which has a view to the downstairs pit. His oak desk, with additional low seating, rests in the far right, and I wonder which object he’d miss most when I throw it through the glass pane.

  “3.” David addresses me with a smile, and my brain nearly short-circuits as my fury doubles. How can he even think to smile at me! “I’d like to introduce you to a few people.”

  I don’t move my gaze from his, ignoring the raised heart rates of the others in the room.

  I will murder you in front of all the people, I silently glower to Axel.

  And have to fill out all that paperwork? he counters with a raised brow.

  It’d be worth it.

  But then who would you blame for random things tomorrow?

  There’s always someone.

  David’s lips twitch, but he smartly refrains from grinning again as he turns to the quiet onlookers. “This is Anthony Ploom, group director from COA.” He gestures to the thin-haired man, who extends a reluctant hand, as though it might come back severed.

  I feed off his fear like an afternoon snack and give him my most feral smile.

  “It’s a pleasure.” He practically squeaks as I grip him firmly, cataloguing the scent of his three cats, breakfast of a single cup of coffee, and the skin discoloration on his ring finger. Recently divorced or separated.

  “Julie Hockins, his tech and intelligent assistant,” David continues, gesturing to the blonde in the room. Her hazel eyes quickly flicker over my body before slipping back to my face, a flush of attraction.

  Interesting.

  “I was very impressed with your file, 3.” Julie’s handshake is steady, her gaze uncowering. “And please, call me Jules.”

  Even in my current temper, I know I’ll like this one.

  Still not having uttered a word, I watch David motion to the final newcomer. “And considering you two have already met…” He lets the words momentarily hang, a body swaying in its noose. “I don’t think we need to introduce Carter Smith.”

  The monster inside me rumbles, pushes against my skin to be freed as my impassive face meets Carter’s dark storm.

  He remains seated at the conference table as neither of us nod an acknowledgment, speak, or move to shake the other’s hand.

  We stay separate.

  Two icebergs claiming separate oceans.

  The mood grows tense, quiet, scared.

  And all I can think is, Good. You all should be terrified.

  In a charcoal buttoned-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up, Carter sits with steepled fingers, elbows resting on either armrest, showing off strong forearms. His brown hair is swept lazily out of his face, and a shadow of stubble brushes across his jawline. Something that wasn’t present in China and brings out his actual age of thirty-two. His green gaze is a mad wizard’s fire as it meets mine, a rolling tsunami about to crash down, and for the first time I think how we have something in common—our fury. His rapid heartbeat of thud thud thud fills my ears as that disturbingly pleasing scent of cinnamon and male flows off him.

  My senses feel skittish taking him in. What is he doing here? What does this mean?

  It’s a rare moment that I’m not in control. Whatever’s about to happen is at the whim of someone else. Someone who’s not me.

  The world becomes a red whirlpool. You could do it, the beast purrs. You could take them all out so quickly, so easily. End what’s about to happen before it begins.

  David clears his throat, and I slam down the monster’s cage, ignoring its displeased preen.

  “Okay, now that we’ve done introductions, let’s get to why we’re all here, shall we?” he says.

  Everyone moves to a seat, and even though I walk with grace, every one of my movements feels jerky, tense, and I roll out a chair next to Akoni, the farthest one from Carter.

  “I’m sure you’re all wondering why a team from COA is meeting with a team from SI6,” David begins, sitting at the front with Ploom. The two look like caricatures of the adjectives big and small. “To put it simply, the sister companies are trying to cross-pollinate their resources, and it was brought to the attention of both boards that we recently had a successful, though unplanned, group assignment take place.”

  His words drip into my brain slowly, building a throb of unease at the base of my skull.

  “And I don’t t
hink I need to explain which recent assignment I’m talking about.” He and Ploom share a look. “Because of this success, and also due to the nature of this next assignment, the companies feel that having the same two teams brought together would be the perfect first test of cross-pollination.”

  The animal’s cage rattles. No no no no no no—

  “3, Carter”—David glances between the two of us—“you’re to join forces.”

  23

  Carter

  SI6 HEADQUARTERS

  CHICAGO, ILLINOIS: 0952 HOURS

  I wonder for a moment if I actually died in China. That I never made it into Kam’s suite that night but instead got my chest blown out by one of his henchmen’s short-barrel shotguns. I’m not really sitting in this office in Chicago, but back in Hong Kong, lying with my guts hanging out and staining the hotel’s red carpet redder. Yes, that must be it, and this—here, now—is merely the devil’s doing, the price for all my sins. For everything about this moment screams my personal hell, and I’m not delusional enough to think heaven would consider even for a second about taking me. I grow slightly relieved at this thought. Being dead is a world better than being alive and sitting across from Medusa’s ugly stepsister.

  When I was told I had to go to Chicago, Ploom said it was to meet with SI6 on what happened in Hong Kong and for us to file an official complaint about the mismatched intelligence. I wasn’t entirely sure why I needed to be present for this, but when he mumbled something about protocol and paying for my entire weekend no matter what I decided to “get into,” I stopped asking questions.

  I should have smelled trap then and there.

  Instead I flew like a dumb little gnat into my team’s web of deception. What a little slimy worm, that Ploom.