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Skyla excused herself and was about to go make their drinks when someone came up from behind. Skyla turned so fast she nearly knocked a tray right out of Nico’s hand.
“Sorry,” he said in his sexy as hell accent. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I figured you’d want to know I was here. Where do you need me?”
Skyla handed him her empty tray along with her running tab. “Here. On the floor. Thanks.” She turned to her friends. “Nico’s going to take over for me for a bit. Have fun.”
She walked away before they could ask her anything else, and disappeared behind the bar into a sea of patrons who started shouting their orders at her. Skyla was only too happy to get lost in their upheaval for a few minutes before her regular bartender returned from his break.
Once he was back, Skyla carefully extricated herself from the bar and made a mad dash for her office. She needed some time to calm down. Get her heart rate lowered and her breathing slowed down. The last thing she wanted to do was meet AJ all wired up from a grueling night. Not that he would care. He owned her, and at the rate her father was borrowing money, it didn’t look like that was going to change anytime soon.
***
Blake stared at his half eaten, cold burger with a hint of disgust. He was seething at the gills as he looked at the clock on the dashboard. It was almost a quarter after nine, and he’d been cooped up in a fake plumber van for the last two hours, waiting for something to happen. He double and triple checked the cloned phone. The text message definitely read nine o’clock. So, where the hell was this guy? And more importantly, where was Vivian?
They’d agreed to meet at the FBI lot and pick up the van together, but when she was twenty minutes late showing up, he left without her, not willing to compromise a case because of an I.A. agent who didn’t know how to tell time.
After their chat in his office, he thought for sure that she was the straight and narrow kind of person, always on time, on top of everything, her head totally in the game. If he was being honest with himself, she’d made him kind of nervous. Like one wrong move and his ass would be back on I.A.’s shit list. Then she was a no show and it was like everything he thought he knew about her flew out the window leaving him in the dark about someone he was ordered to cooperate with.
Blake’s cell phone buzzed with an incoming message. If it was from Vivian, he was going to ignore it. He wasn’t in the mood to play games. He looked at the screen.
Caden: Arlo J just left. Guess he’s running late.
Blake blew out a breath in frustration. Caden was parked across town keeping an eye on the motorcycle club headquarters. Apparently, Vivian wasn’t the only one who had issues with punctuality.
Blake: About time. Still want me to just recon the situation or should I drag their asses in?
Caden: Strictly recon. Nothing else. I mean it.
Blake huffed. If it was anyone else he might give them a piece of his mind for treating him like he didn’t know how to follow orders, but this was Caden.
Blake: Copy that.
Blake set his phone on the dash and sat back in the seat, only slightly less tense than he was a minute ago. The motorcycle club was less than a thirty-minute drive from Madigan’s so Arlo J should be arriving in the next half hour. Then it would be time to get to work. Until then, Blake picked up his burger and took another bite. He was just about to reach for his drink when the passenger side door of the van opened and he nearly choked while rushing to reach for his weapon.
“Stand down, it’s just me,” a female voice whispered and hurried to get in and quietly shut the door behind her.
Blake didn’t need to see her face in the nearly pitch dark van to know who it was. “Vivian. Where the hell have you been? And what the hell are you wearing?”
She smiled. “I was doing your job and since it doesn’t look like I missed much of anything out here, I’d say you owe me a thanks.”
Blake glared at her like the woman was out of her mind. “Why are you wearing a Madigan’s tank top?”
“A woman spilled her drink on me,” she said. “It was really kind of embarrassing, but then the owner gave me this,” she gestured to her shirt, “and introduced me to the woman who bumped into me and then we all started talking.”
“Are you talking about Skyla? How did she know the woman who bumped into you?” Blake asked.
Vivian shrugged. “Said they were friends. Her name was Orly something. She was there with her husband Luke and then another woman showed up. Hallie.” Vivian gave him a knowing grin that made Blake even more uneasy about her than he was before. What was Vivian doing getting to know his friends? More than friends, these people were like family to him.
“What’s your angle?” He demanded.
Vivian shrugged again, offering him a placating smile, but he wasn’t buying it. “Just trying to do my job.”
“Since when did interrogating my friends without their knowledge become part of your job description?” He asked, his patience wearing thin.
“Interrogating?” She balked. “We were talking. Laughing, too. I had fun.”
She said that last part like she either hadn’t planned on enjoying herself or hadn’t ever had any fun before. It was strange and gave Blake a sort of hollow feeling that left him cold on the inside. “Look, I get we have to work together, but leave my friends out of it.”
“Isn’t Hallie in a relationship with Agent Dobbs?” She asked, only making the chill in Blake go deeper. He didn’t think anyone at the bureau knew that, and Blake had no idea how she did.
