Page 82 of Perfect Pursuit

“You’re benching me?” The kick in the gut is just one more agony tonight. Though nothing as bad as when I figured out it was Fallon’s hot as fuck voice trying to get me off—and succeeding—while I called into the Devil’s Lair as my colleagues listened in.

“Just until I get more intel.”

“Then why the fuck are you babysitting me? Call your other friends for intel and leave me to my fucking misery,” I bellow.

He ignores me in typical Thorn fashion and instead pesters me about Fallon. “Why are you so convinced she’s involved. Neither Q?za nor Sam can find any evidence that lights her up in their initial check.”

“She’s working there. That’s enough.” I rub my hand over the ache blooming in my heart.

Thorn hums contemplatively.

“What’s that supposed to mean, Thorn?”

“What would your reaction be—right now—if I wanted to bring her in for questioning?”

Every drop of blood leaches from my face. I may be furious as hell at Fallon, but I don’t want to see her go missing in an underground prison for the rest of her life. “No. Just…no.”

“But you’re so convinced of her guilt.”

“Thorn!” I snap.

“She’s yours, Ethan,” he taunts in that fucking know-it-all way he has that’s driven every agent who ever worked for him insane. “Just admit she got to you. It’s happened before.”

She got to me when she was eighteen years old. I refuse to admit the woman I knew as “Filia” got to me in any way. The bitter bite of betrayal surges through my veins.

Thorn makes a tsking noise. “I think you need to stop everything and think, but what do I know?” he asks then disconnects the call.

“Bastard.” At that point, I’m not certain if I’m referring to Thorn or myself.

You. You’re referring to yourself, asshole.

Shoving away from my desk, I whip out my cell phone and pull up my text string with Fallon, scrolling back a few days before I knew what I know now—that she’s working for an organization that’s in bed with criminals.

I knew she was far too young for me. Christ, she’s my niece’s best friend. She’s a fleet of red flags I ignored because I wanted to be able to what? Stand on top of a foundation of lust to proclaim she was mine? Look where that got me. Every warning I gave myself about becoming involved with her pales to the fact there’s a high probability she may be involved with illegal activities.

“I knew I should have resisted you,” I say aloud as I read through the last few days of our texts. Based on the schedule at Devil’s Lair I hacked, she’s at work right now. I could log in and listen to her phone calls live, but I can’t do it.

I just can’t.

Especially after the last one where she cut out the heart of me. I recall each and every detail in full, unable to shove it out of my mind knowing it was my Fallon who so used it with a complete stranger.

A fantasy I came close to orgasming to because I knew it was her.

Only she didn’t know it was me.

The disgust I feel right now is the only thing that pushes me through to complete this job so I can stop fighting the pain I know I’m setting myself up for. I also know I can’t talk with her. I can’t listen to her breathless sighs as she takes herself there. Instead, I set up a bot to text her around 2 AM when she’s supposedly going to get off work at Galileo’s to say, “Sleep well.”

Because one of us needs to.

I’ll be too busy trying to pull her proverbial fat out of the fryer so she can make more mistakes in her young life.

Just none that will include me after this.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

SEVEN VIRTUES, NORTH CAROLINA

Dr. Paige Kensington, wife to rock superstar Beckett Miller, was recently spotted coming out of a free children’s clinic in New York City. Although she refused to stop for questions, Carys Burke-Lennan, the duo’s legal counsel who often speaks for them, confirmed Dr. Kensington was performing hearing checks for the underprivileged.

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