Page 6 of The Wrecked One

“Have good taste?” I waited for her to look at my face before offering her one of my silly, wolfish grins that usually made her crack a smile.

No smile that time. Damn.

Instead, she pointed at my camera, frowning. Except her index finger was actually directed south of where the camera hung, and my lips twitched in reaction to the fact she was gesturing toward my crotch as she said, “That thing shouldn’t ever be pointed at me.” She waved me off before I had a chance to tease her. “We were there to get other pictures.”

“It was you or the birds.” I shrugged. “I found you much more interesting.”

“I wasn’t expecting pigeons. These anonymous tips aren’t usually this big of a bust.” She smoothed her hand from her collarbone to her shoulder as if trying to brush away the few dark freckles that’d appeared from our time outside. Her naturally golden-tan skin, credited to her Italian ancestry, had deepened in color from the recent sun exposure. One thing she’d forgotten to pack, and I now made a mental note to buy, was sunscreen.

It took all my restraint not to lean forward and set my lips to the dusting of freckles there, then work my mouth up the side of her neck to her earlobe, making her laugh since she was ticklish in those spots. “Unless those birds require a rectal exam because someone stuffed pills in?—”

“Don’t finish that sentence.” She rolled her eyes.

“Who has pigeons delivered by way of a private jet, then transferred by boat. It’s kind of bizarre now that I’m thinking about it. Maybe it’s even Pulitzer-worthy.”

Nope, not amused at all by my joke. “They weren’t just any pigeons, they’re racing ones. It’s a sport. They’re specially trained homing pigeons and people bet on them like they would a horse race. That’s the only story, and it’s not going to help our case.” She mouthed at the end of her mini-lecture, “The real one, either.”

“Wait, pigeon racing? That’s a thing? For real?”

The second the elevator doors opened, she hurried inside, not bothering to answer my lame attempt to help change her mood with a little humor.

She was empty-handed, like almost every other day we went out chasing leads and also our tails. Or feathers, in today’s case.

I joined her inside, feeling the heavy weight of her stuff in my pockets. A copy of her passport and ID, iPhone, hotel keycard, and the lipstick color of the day: cherry-blossom pink. More like pain-in-my-ass pink.

Mya flung her arms across her chest in dramatic fashion, appearing to wilt against the mirrored glass wall as if defeated now instead of mad.

At the sight of her confidence waning, which probably had more to do with frustration in our lack of leads than with me, I hurried in and joined her. I parked a hand over her shoulder, waiting for her eyes to land on me.

“No more photos of me. You’re just lucky those don’t upload directly to FYVM’s servers.”

And my feisty girl is back. I’d take angry over sad, though. “They’re just a few photos.” Of you looking gorgeous standing beneath the sun, and it made me physically hurt not to reach out and touch you.

There was beautiful, and then there was Mya-beautiful.

Five-six, the perfect fit to rest my chin on top of her head. Light brown, almond-shaped eyes with long, dark lashes that were constantly narrowed on me like she either wanted to fuck me or kill me. Silky hair that fell just shy of her breasts, and damn did I miss tangling it around my hand while we kissed. Then there was her heart-shaped face, and that one dimple that only made rare appearances when she was truly excited about something. I hadn’t seen that dimple since November.

There were no tattoos on her golden skin. Not yet, at least. I was tempted to drag her along with me to get a tattoo, since I was a fan, but there was that nagging part of my brain that worried searing ink into one’s skin might be a bad idea. I refused to have her do anything dangerous for her health. Ironically, our jobs were much more dangerous than a tattoo ever would be.

“That’s not why you’re really upset,” I said as the doors chimed open on floor eleven. My room was on the next floor up, and I had no plans to go there yet. We had a conversation to finish. Or a fight. I wasn’t sure which way the wind was about to blow with her.

Pushing away from the wall, I stepped aside to free her from the small space, then followed her to her suite.

Down the hall, and outside her door, she opened her hand. “Please.”

“Since you asked nicely.” I handed her the key, and the second we were both inside, I followed protocol and swept the living room and bedroom for bugs, ensuring no one could hear or see us in there. “All clear,” I said while setting aside the device our teammate, Sydney Archer-Hawkins, had provided us courtesy of her father’s company. “So, spill it. What’s really going on?”

Inside the living room, which was modern and luxurious without an exorbitant price tag, she walked over to the wall of windows that overlooked the cityscape.

After emptying the contents of my pockets, I set the Nikon on the table and joined her at the window.

Sighing, she faced me, resting her shoulder against the glass, arms locking over her chest, an unspoken barrier between us. For both our benefits, more than likely.

Barbed wire. Rusty nails poking from rotted wood. An electric fence. None of those would be an obstacle if this woman gave me any signal to hold or kiss her. So, her crossed arms were a lousy defense to stop this thing that was still raging between us, even after two-plus months of undercover work.

Despite how long this mission was taking, we truly had stepped into our roles as journalist and photographer. We’d dug in so deep that I was starting to forget it wasn’t real. Unfortunately, we’d yet to have any private meetings with Hugo Soren. Mya hadn’t been asked to compromise her morals and write a story we hoped would be secretly at The Collective’s request either.

So far, at least from what we could tell, our covers were managing to hold up, which was more than I could say about my willpower. Nope, that was crumbling. Straight through all the reasons we were supposed to stay apart while undercover.

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