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His hands slammed down on the armrests hard, making me jump.
“You were in the second last table on the left side of the building. Your back was to the door, there was a couple having breakfast three tables over, a mother and child at the counter, and three people were there on their own, at tables two, six, and eight. There were two waitresses and one chef, and it was two minutes after you guys sat down that the man following you entered the building. You left at five past twelve, the man left within seconds, and then the Psychos started tailing you as you entered Ashburn Valley. You arrived at Devil’s Dungeon at—”
“Okay, I get it! But you had time to study the cameras, I didn’t!” I snapped, shoving at his chest but he hardly budged. “I can’t remember all that shit!”
His fingers wrapped around my throat as he glared down at me, his voice low.
“That’s the report Leah texted me while you two were at the bar. I asked, she answered. A thief always knows their surroundings and they always take in details that don’t seem important, but might be later. The Night Thieves don’t just steal shit, Princess, we do protection details and occasionally help the crews. We have a permanent target on our backs but no one really knows who we are either. We’re a silent organization that’s slowly climbing the ranks to become something huge in the underground. If you intend on staying here, you’d better learn fast what it means to be a Night Thief. Next time I ask you for a report, you’d better reel details off like your life depends on it.” His grip loosened a fraction but he didn’t let go. “You want me to see you as more than a spoiled princess? Fucking prove yourself. I don’t take anyone’s word, I need to see proof. You’re staying here tomorrow, I’m teaching you to shoot.”
“You’re not worried about me shooting you in your sleep?” I deadpanned, and I swore amusement flashed in his eyes.
“If you can sneak up on me in my sleep and shoot me, you’re more skilled than I thought. Knox can’t catch me off guard, so you can’t. Have fun trying though, but remember if I catch you standing over me with a gun to my head, that you’d better pull the trigger fast. You won’t like what happens if you hesitate.” He let me go and stepped back, his voice lighter. “Cruz, she’s all yours.”
I didn’t understand until I realized Cruz was sitting at one of the computer’s in the back, eyeing us carefully.
“You didn’t have to be such a dick about it,” Cruz muttered as he got to his feet and started towards me, and Stone snorted.
“That was me being nice and you know it. Go over the videos with her, show her everything she missed, then test her. She won’t make it with us if she can’t fucking remember shit.”
He gave me a dirty look before leaving the room, and Cruz slid his hand around the back of my neck, his thumb stroking my skin as he peered down at me.
“Considering he’s rattled about you girls having a tail, I think he handled that quite well.”
“Why does he care if someone takes me? His problems would be gone then,” I huffed, a smile curving his lips.
“No offense, but he doesn’t care about you, he cares about his organization being compromised. We were like ghosts, no one knew who we were, but then we were pulled out of hiding by Lopez to help his friends. Now all the crews know we exist and we started selling our goods face-to-face so we’re not so invisible anymore. Visible thieves aren’t good, so you can imagine how stressed it’s making him. Come look at the footage and tell me what you see.” He pulled me to my feet and steered me towards the computer he’d been working on, and he sat down before pulling me onto his lap.
“Is this the footage from today?” I asked, and he nodded as he opened multiple recordings and spread them over a few monitors. He pressed play on the one of us arriving in Crestford, and I spotted the man’s car straight away. “That’s the guy.”
“Good. Now watch the whole thing.” The man had been watching us the whole time and the thought turned my stomach sour. He seemed to be on his phone a lot, his eyes trained on us. “Leah noticed him already by this point, she’s looking at things on racks that face the windows so she can keep an eye on him discreetly.”
“How do you know she actually saw him? Maybe she’s just browsing.”
“She’s doing as much as she can with her training. Eyes on windows, she looked around at exits and cameras, and in this next part she starts walking around beside you instead of just wandering. She knows he’s there and she also knows that you don’t. She didn’t want to scare you and risk you making a scene, so she kept a silent eye out and let you shop in peace. Once you guys sat down for lunch, she told you because she had no choice.”
“Why did we stop for lunch if there was a crazy guy following us?” I muttered, making him chuckle as his lips brushed my neck.
“Leah loves girl time for starters, but she also would’ve been testing him to see if he was just being a creepy perv, or if he was actually following you guys. It also gave her time to sit down and text me without making it obvious.”
He continued to point out little things as we watched the entire ordeal, and I cringed when it got to the part where the Psychos dragged the man away and put him in the van.
“What’s going to happen to him?”
“It’s better you don’t think about it.”
I interpreted that to mean the man was already dead or wishing that he was, so I changed the subject.
“Can you see everything on these cameras?”
“You bet. We can hack into anything,” he grinned, opening other screens to show me random places in live view. A gas station I’d seen in Stoneleigh, a coffee shop in Ashburn Valley, and even a private home in Kingslake. “This is how we stake out a lot of jobs and learn routines. We’ll watch a property for weeks before going in and taking shit. We hack security, shut things down, and get in and out without any evidence left behind. That’s how we fucked up with you. You didn’t leave the house so we didn’t know you were there. There’s no proof you exist so we kept an eye on your father and Estelle. That’s it.”
“I’m glad you guys fucked up,” I said softly, threading my hands together on my lap, and he tightened his arms around me and pressed his lips to my neck just below my ear, moving higher to nibble on my earlobe.
“I’m glad we fucked up too.” His fingers wound through my hair and tugged my face around awkwardly to kiss me, and he let out a groan when I bit his lip. “We can learn more later. Break time.”
I giggled as he stood, forcing me to wrap my legs around him, and he carried me from the room and along the hallway. I left kisses and bite marks on his neck, my fingers tight in his hair.
“Shit, we need condoms,” he said with a sigh, and I pulled away from devouring his neck to give him a grin.
