Rare Vigilance (Whitethorn Agency)

Cristian didn’t argue with her. Instead, he drew back and glanced past Atlas toward Ioana. “Get Mr. Kinkaid out of my sight.”

Atlas didn’t wait for her to escort him away. He walked out of the small room of his own volition, head held high. Vasilica had already vacated to the hall, where she leaned against the wall to watch Atlas. She had the grace to wait for Ioana to close the door behind them before saying, “Well, that could have gone better.”

Atlas braced for her to unleash on him. Instead, she offered him a shrug. “But, since he didn’t try to rip out your throat, I guess it didn’t go too badly either.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Constantin said, clapping Atlas on the shoulder. He looked a little nervous to be so close, but he didn’t move his hand right away. He was offering...comfort? A dubious attempt, but an attempt nonetheless. “We’ve all dealt with something like this at one time or another.”

Andrei grunted in agreement. “Never stood our ground though. Either you’re brave or stupid.”

“Or maybe just good at my job,” Atlas argued.

Constantin gave a slow nod. “Yeah, you’re good at that too. Cristian won’t ever say it to your face, but he does know that. We all do.”

Not reaching out to accept that olive branch could come back to bite him in the ass one day soon, so Atlas seized the moment. “Thank you, Constantin—”

“Dinu.” He tilted his head, his dark hair falling over his brow and a genuine smile lighting his face. “Anyone who’s trying to keep Cristian safe gets to call me Dinu.”

“Fine. Dinu. Thanks.”

Ioana cleared her throat. “Mr. Kinkaid,” she said, “we can take care of Cristian from here. It won’t be long until he’s—” She made a face, one that wrinkled her nose and made her look younger, hinting there might be something beyond her seriousness. “I just mean that we’ll bring him out to the car once he’s done.”

“And,” Vasilica said with a grin, “if you’re already in the car, he can’t slip past you and leave you here, a mistake which would require an explanation to his father.”

“Good point,” Atlas said, surprised by the help. “I’ll have the valet bring it around.”

Dinu walked him the short distance to the employees-only door, fidgeting all the way. Atlas sighed and came to a halt before he stepped back out into the club proper. This probably wasn’t a conversation to be had in public.

“Spit it out,” Atlas said.

“Look, you may not want to hear this, but you seem to actually give a shit about this job beyond the paycheck,” Dinu muttered. “So you should know... Decebal isn’t the only one who values loyalty. Cristian values it more than his own safety. Lots of the other agents, they didn’t get that. They didn’t realize how hard Cristian works to keep us in his father’s good graces. So I wouldn’t worry about the clinic or Nell or anything. He’ll take care of it all. That make sense, Mr. Kinkaid?”

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“Atlas,” he said without hesitation. And then he lied, “And yes, it does. I appreciate the explanation.”

He mulled over Dinu’s words long after he dropped the crew off at Decebal’s house and returned to his shitty apartment. Doing his job and ensuring Cristian’s safety were his contractual obligations. Yet Dinu made it sound like it was Cristian’s role to ensure the safety of everyone else, and that doing otherwise was a sign of disloyalty. He just couldn’t figure out if Dinu was referring to his curiosity about Nell, or his reaction to James in the back room. Regardless of the situation, Atlas would put Cristian’s safety first. It was his duty as a professional.

Unbidden, he recalled Cristian’s accusation. Did you wish it was you?

He groaned and turned over in his bed, staring at his alarm clock in a fruitless attempt to forget the final barb and his subsequent embarrassment. He hadn’t come up with a response then, and he still couldn’t figure one out now.

The minutes ticked by. He ran through the night again, trying to find evidence to disprove Cristian’s assumption. No matter how many times he tried, his memory kept sticking on foolish details, like the way the flush had spread over Cristian’s chest, or the way the shadows caught along the line of his jaw when he tilted his head back—

The twist in his stomach was warm, gentle, and nothing like the frustrated churning he normally experienced when he reflected on the day’s shift. It was tantalizing. And wrong. There were few commandments held for Whitethorn employees, but no entanglements with clients was at the top of the list.

He twisted onto his back and threw an arm over his eyes, desperate to block the images from replaying again. It didn’t work. The longer he lay there, the clearer the awful truth became: Cristian Slava was not just another job, and he was absolutely fucked.

Chapter Six

“To what do I owe this dubious pleasure?” Bea asked when the bakery bag landed on her desk.

“Wanted to pick your brain for a bit.” Atlas made himself comfortable in the chair opposite her and watched with amusement as she used a pen to delicately peer into the bag. “Pain au chocolat,” he told her. “I braved the lunch crowd for it.”

“Oof, now I know you fucked up somehow,” Bea mused. It didn’t stop her from neatly setting aside the paperwork she’d been doing to focus on the treat.

“Last shift was a bit rough,” he admitted.

Bea hummed and pulled out the pastry, eyeing it with a hunger that told Atlas she hadn’t eaten yet this morning. “Migraine?”