Page 14 of Wicked Suspicion

Her voice trailed off and Case finished her sentence. “If we had something serious, and you were opposed, I would have bowed to your wishes or our relationship probably wouldn’t have survived the arguments.”

“If you were already a merc, I would either need to accept it or end things and since you didn’t tell me what you did until I was already in love with you, I had no choice. I still hope to convince you to find a real job and don’t get me started about the gunrunning.”

Her tone and expression had Case fighting a smile. “Since you were at the ruins to make sure I was okay and not for your job, we’ll leave the Paladin League out of our story, okay?”

Nyx nodded. “We’ll just say I work temp jobs while I’m earning my PhD.”

The water spit, hissed, and the flow slowed to a trickle. Time was up. Reaching in, Case turned the shower off. He’d probably gotten all the surveillance equipment, but he wished he’d had a few more minutes to warn her they needed to be cautious. They had to act on the assumption that he missed something. Their lives might depend on it.

There was one more thing he wished they’d covered. Demonstrations of affection. Nothing overt. He wasn’t thinking about kissing her in front of Vargas, but he did need to be able to touch her without Nyx flinching. Just reaching for her hand was iffy. When he’d done that to lead her into the bathroom, she’d gone rigid. If she reacted like that in front of Vargas, they were cooked.

Slowly, carefully, Case raised his hand and ran his thumb across her cheek. He’d surprised her, but Nyx didn’t jerk away or display her shock in any way. He smiled and nodded, trying wordlessly to tell her she’d done well.

And then she stunned him. Nyx reached up and ran her fingers along his jaw. “The beard would look better trimmed.” Without another word, she turned and left the bathroom.

One of them needed to get used to touching, and it seemed it was him.

Case flipped through the TV stations, not settling on any channel for long. He’d expected Vargas to summon him for a meeting, but it hadn’t happened. Yet. It was a tactic, one meant to make him sweat. If it were only him, he wouldn’t be too concerned, but his co-captive changed the equation.

As if on cue, Nyx wandered into the sitting room from the bedroom and dropped down onto the couch beside him, but not too close. “Are you okay?” he asked, switching off the TV and putting the remote on the coffee table.

She nodded. “Bored. There’s nothing to do.”

“You’re not scared?” She should be and suspicion reared up. Either she was lying about being bored or she was lying about working for the Paladin League.

“I was, but fear only lasts for so long.”

True, but it was a little quick for her to be over her trepidation and into boredom. He wished he could question her some more. Maybe there was a way to get more intel without tipping off Vargas and company. “Hiking into the rainforest alone was reckless.”

Her eyes narrowed, but the reaction was slight enough to be unnoticeable unless someone was watching her closely. Like he was. He waited for her to argue with him, but she surprised him.

“I know. I considered it a calculated risk. I couldn’t let you go in without backup, hon.”

There was a saccharine note in her last sentence. Case ignored it and parsed what she’d shared. She’d considered it a calculated risk. For her job?

Stony, the teammate who used to have the role Case was in now, worked for the Paladin League and Archer. How hard would it have been for her to learn this and use it to ingratiate herself with him? She might even be a pawn, sent in by someone who wanted to infiltrate their op. Maybe she was working for someone other than Vargas. The rebels?

He hated having these suspicions. He wished he could trust Nyx to be who and what she said she was. He didn’t want to worry that his attraction to her was blinding him to truths he should be able to see.

But Case couldn’t ignore the questions.

She had the skill and toughness to hike alone into the rainforest and climb the pyramid. That didn’t mean training like some super spy or covert agent, but it suggested Nyx did more than go to the gym four days a week and doom scroll while she half-assed it on the elliptical.

If she hadn’t shown up at the open-air market three days ago while he’d been there. If she hadn’t shared his table. If she hadn’t left him practically drooling over her, he would be less suspicious. But he didn’t like the fact that she arrived at the food trailer while he was waiting for a teammate, and he definitely didn’t like her being at the ruins at the same time as his meeting.

Yeah.

He noticed one of the guards looking at them through the window. As Case turned his head, the man glanced away.

She’d been carrying when Vargas’s men found her. Not some peashooter either, but a Walther PDP F-Series pistol. That suggested some firearms knowledge. The weapon was accurate, reliable, and the F-Series was designed for people with smaller hands, like Nyx. She was dressed appropriately for the rainforest, and from what he’d seen, she brought the right supplies with her.

But someone who had training would know better than to go into the rainforest alone. Wouldn’t they?

“You’re frowning, honey bear.”

Case’s attention jerked back to Nyx. “I’m frowning because you never should have gone by yourself, no matter the circumstances. You know better than that.”

“Sometimes there are no better options.”

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