I head that way, Anna’s eyes moving past Cage to me as I approach. She smiles—short and wan—which means Cage has probably worn her out with some long-winded and highly ridiculous travesties he has going on with his girlfriend.
Pushing the glass door open, Cage cranes his neck my way. I give him a chin lift, and he smiles back.
Feeling so damn good with how my morning has gone down, I don’t care there’s an audience of one in Anna’s office. I move past Cage, around her desk, and bro code be fucking damned, I lean toward her. One hand behind her neck, I hold her still and bestow upon her one righteously hot kiss.
Anna gives a soft gasp of surprise. When I pull away, I look toward Cage in defiance. I dare him to say something to me about it.
Instead, he just regards me impassively.
I straighten, look to Anna, back to Cage, then to Anna once again.
“I told Cage about us,” she murmurs guiltily.
“No worries.” The easygoing tone has her eyes narrowing slightly. Giving my attention to Cage, I ask, “How was Vegas?”
Cage flushes, which is a bit weird.
Anna says, “Cage got married to Jaime.”
I do a double-take, my jaw dropping. “You did?”
He nods and I find myself smiling broadly, sticking my hand out for him to shake.
Cage takes it, looking like he just swallowed something nasty and bitter. I frown in confusion, glancing back at Anna to try to figure out why he’d look so put out.
Anna nods her head at Cage, her lips pressed flat. “Genius there still hasn’t told Jaime the truth about what he does for a living.”
My mouth hangs open as I swivel my head his way. “She still doesn’t know? And you got married?”
“Stop with the recriminations,” Cage retorts. “I already got an earful from your girlfriend there.”
Yes, it pleases me to hear Anna referred to in that way. I stand duly chastised though and offer Cage an apologetic incline of my head. “Sorry, dude. I assume Anna has already managed to read you the riot act about telling her the truth as soon as possible.”
“Yeah, and I’m going to do it as soon as I can get some downtime with her. Leaving tomorrow for Ft. Bragg doesn’t make that an ideal time right now.”
“Agreed,” I say, then immediately take off on a tangent. “So, who else is going with us tomorrow?”
I can’t contain the excitement of getting back in the saddle again, and nothing says a rousing good time like free-falling out of a plane. For an adrenaline junkie like me, being a recon marine satisfied so much of my soul. During my active-duty time, I’d trained in all kinds of jumps, including HALO, HAHO, and static line. I did water and scuba training, high-speed driving, and, of course, the ever-dreaded but no-less-bad-ass SERE school where they teach survival, evasion, resistance, and escape techniques.
“Ladd McDermott… he’s former CIA but was an Army ranger before that, so he’s done all this stuff before. And Jackson Gale. He’s former Navy SEAL like me. And Bodie Wright from the Vegas office is going to join us, too.”
“I haven’t met Bodie yet,” I say, although I’ve met his wife, Rachel, who runs the Vegas branch of Jameson.
“Super cool dude,” Cage replies. “Oh, and Kynan might come with. There’s no bigger adrenaline junkie than him. That fucker once jumped off Angel Falls in a wingsuit.”
“No shit?” I ask, seriously impressed. As much as I love the feeling of free-falling, that’s a level of crazy I don’t ever intend to pursue.
“Hey,” Anna says from behind her desk, and we turn to face her. “I have a ton of work to do, so why don’t you two let a girl have some peace?”
I scrutinize her beauty. She has a genial smile on her face, seeming to legit want to get to work. This I can understand now that I’m allowed back in the thick of things.
“Okay,” I reply, moving back to her side. I bend to give her a soft kiss. Pulling back just slightly, I ask, “Can I come over tonight? I’ll pick up some takeout.”
She smiles with a nod. “Sounds great. I’ll be home with Avery around six-thirty.”
“Awesome. See you then.” Another brush of my lips across hers, then Cage and I are heading out of her office. When we clear her door, I gaze back over my shoulder at Anna, but her head is already bent over some documents on her desk and I’m apparently forgotten.
I follow Cage out among the pit desks, intent to follow him to his desk so we can talk more about our trip to Ft. Bragg tomorrow. Then I’ll head to the desk that had been assigned to me to read up on the situation down in Colombia.
But Anna’s voice stops me in my tracks as she calls my name. I turn to see her standing in the doorway to her office, one hand on the jamb. “Got a minute to talk?”