Undercover Engagement (Private Pleasures 5)

Her lingering frown suggested she knew he was leaving out quite a bit of history. He took a big bite of his sandwich to discourage questions, but all she followed up with was, “How long were you in?”

“Six years. Special team. Special projects.”

“Why’d you leave?”

“I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.”

She threw a chip at him. “I’d like to see you try, cooyon.”

How the hell c

ould he hold anything back from such a woman? And why the hell? It really wasn’t a big secret. “I was tired of working covertly. I sort of liked the idea of wearing a uniform out in the open and planting roots in one place as myself instead of bouncing from hot zone to hot zone as whatever persona Uncle Sam ordered me to assume. I know, right?” he acknowledged when she tipped her head and raised her brows. Cruel irony, ending up on an undercover operation straight out of the gate. “But once this assignment ends, I’ll get what I’m after. There might be more undercover jobs here and there—it’s a sprawling county—but it won’t be a regular thing.”

Eden wiped her hands on her napkin and tossed it on her empty plate. “Sounds like the sooner we conclude this assignment, the sooner we both get to move on to what we really want.”

“True.” Except that right now, he really wanted to work this op with her. He stood and took their plates to the sink and began rinsing them. “But in the meantime, the fringe benefits of this assignment are pretty damn good, choux. Doncha think?”

“Working construction? Living in a one-bedroom dump?”

He looked over his shoulder at her. “I got me a ten-plus bride-to-be, making me sandwiches and doing my laundry.”

“Doing your laundry? That’s not in my job description.” In the other room, a phone rang. Hers. She strolled out of the kitchen on those best-in-class legs, boot-fringe a-swingin’. “Don’t push your luck, Swain.”

But he would. Yeah, he probably would, because just like Romy, he never knew when to quit.

…

“Have you murdered him yet?”

Her KDOCJ roommate didn’t know the specifics of the assignment, but Natalia Alvarez knew Eden had been partnered with Swain for a cross-agency operation.

“Not yet, though there have been many close calls.”

“How long have you been at it?”

She looked at the digital clock on the rickety spindle-legged nightstand. “Twenty-four hours, give or take.”

Alverez’s throaty laugh rippled over the line. “Mija, my money’s on you.”

There was some new note in her friend’s voice. Maybe happiness or satisfaction? Her new job must be agreeing with her. “It probably shouldn’t be,” Eden admitted. “He’s actually really good at what we’ve been asked to do. That part I can handle. But he’s also cocky as shit, as you know, and a loose cannon. And a slippery bastard.” She lowered her voice, even though she’d heard Swain go out to the porch a few minutes ago. “I can’t turn my back on him.”

“Hmm. Remember Taser Day?”

Taser Day—when the cadets Tased each other so they would gain the experience of Tasing someone, as well as the knowledge of what it felt like to take a jolt. A five-second hit felt like five eons of electrified hell, as every scream, sob, and curse to fill the air that afternoon had attested, but it had nonetheless been a highlight of her time at KDOCJ. Smiling, she replied, “Best day of basic.”

They’d drawn names to determine who they Tased. Alvarez had drawn her name, and Eden had counted herself lucky, because her roommate gave her a clean shot—both prongs embedded, one shock, an agonizing bout of temporary paralysis, and it was over. Normally she would have gained no pleasure from inflicting pain on a classmate, but the gods had smiled on her. She’d drawn Swain. He’d tried to get out of it by mentioning to their instructor that he’d been Tased before, but the instructor had simply said, “Great. You know what to expect.”

He had known, judging by the way he’d locked his jaw, kept the rest of his body loose, and dropped to the ground with one low, stifled groan. No screaming. No cursing. Not even when she remembered their pat-down exercise and gave the trigger a tiny second pull. At the end, he rolled over, looked at her, and said, “Was it good for you, too, choux?”

“Fantastic,” she’d said, handed the instructor the Taser, and walked away.

“As much as I enjoyed sending fifty thousand volts into Swain, I’m grateful I got you,” Eden said. “You stepped up, did the deed, and stepped down. People all around us were effing it up—one probe in, no probes in. Redo, redo. Redo. Nobody wants that.”

“I know,” Alvarez replied. “Carson drew my name. He missed completely on the first try. Prongs bounced off me on the second. On the third, he finally got a good hit and was so excited he forgot to take his motherfucking finger off the trigger. I swear I flopped around like a fish out of water for ten full seconds before the instructor karate chopped the Taser out of his hand.”

“He was so into you, Nat, and so intimidated. That’s why he screwed up. You were taken, at the time, but he looked at you the way a thirsty man looks at a long, cold drink. He wanted to get after you. I’ll bet his hands were shaking the whole time. What’s Carson up to these days? Do you know?”

“He’s engaged. To me.”