Page 27 of Mob Bride

I nod, allowing more tears to dribble down my cheeks. He keeps wiping them away. Do they give Oscars to undercover agents? This is a recurring serial show. Maybe it’s a daytime Emmy. I wait for the next inevitable question.

“Why did you go with Shane? Jacek said he saw you with him.”

“I didn’t know who he was until after we stopped running. I guess he thought I was a weird man or something because he chased me first and knocked me to the ground.”

Before Bartek gets upset—even more upset—I rush to clarify.

“I’m positive he didn’t know who I was when he did it. He kept insisting he had to get me to safety. How could I possibly turn that down? He wasn’t shooting at anybody in the lumberyard. Nobody in the lumberyard was shooting at him. I knew whoever he was, he was a man spying on you. But he seemed like my safest bet. I didn’t know where Jacek went. I wasn’t looking in that direction. I was looking at the lumberyard. I was looking in front of me. All I wanted to do was get away, and that’s what I did.”

“Yeah, and you got in a car with him. Jacek saw all of that.” Bartek’s temper is flaring.

“I know.” I aim to sound dejected. “And that was probably just as stupid as going there in the first place. But you’re you, and I’m me. I don’t know if you can truly understand just how terrifying that was, and how all I wanted to do was survive to get to you. I know getting in that car with him meant I had just as great a chance of dying as I did getting to you. But that need to be here was so much stronger. I feel like such a fool. Can you ever forgive me? Forgive me for doubting you. Forgive me for not trusting you. Forgive me for being?—”

My face crumples again as more tears come, and I sob. He no longer looks doubtful, but he is a sociopath. I might pretend because it’s my job, but he can hide his emotions or make them appear however he wants with no thought. I’ve seen him do it. He just drops into whatever persona he believes he has to be.

“Nothing is going to happen. It’s all forgiven already. I was away from you the last two days because I was sorting out thatmess. It wasn’t me avoiding you because I was angry. I was avoiding you only to keep you safe. To not have you anywhere near me after what just happened. But you’re here now. You’re with me, and I don’t want you to go anywhere. At least not for today, and I want you to stay with me tonight.”

I nod my head and lean against his chest again, but I continue to cry.

“Kaja, I just want to hold you. I won’t ask anything else of you. Just be near me. Don’t be out of my reach. At least not until morning.”

Chapter Seven

Shane

That is not even remotely how I pictured today would go. I certainly never imagined when I went to eavesdrop, I would find the most frustrating woman I have ever met hanging out there, too. I didnotexpect to chase after her. I didnotexpect to kiss her and make her come. The only thing I expected was for an inevitable shitshow at the meeting because those almost never go smoothly. A shootout was the only thing I could have fathomed.

Instead, I wind up spending half the morning following Carrie—I noticed that’s how I think of her now—and then going into her apartment and kissing her. What the fuck possessed me to do that? But nothing I said was untrue. I’m definitely attracted to her, and I definitely care what happens to her. But there are just too many secrets and too many lies from her. I understand why she has to tell some of these lies, why she has to keep some of these secrets. I definitely didn’t picture her being a DEA agent.

And that complicates the hell out of everything. Not whether I could date her or even have her as a fuck buddy—I’m notinterested in dating a woman who picks an argument at every corner. It complicates things because everybody in my family could be on death row if she says the wrong thing to the right people. I don’t know if I can trust her with who my family is. The only reason she might be trustworthy is because her mom is in the thick of it. Any investigation into us could lead to Meredith, even though we’ve all done our best to keep her out of sight and out of mind.

There’s no guarantee a little digging for a court case wouldn’t bring her name up. It leaves me with more questions than answers, which is a recurring theme with Carrie. It’s a thought I have over and over again. Frankly, it’s getting frustrating and old to always think that. But regardless of how I feel about her, she’s now become a major problem—hindrance—pain in my arse. I don’t even know how to describe what she is.

But I know I’d like to fuck her brains out. Fuck. My cock swells every time I think of her, now that I know what she feels like. If only we could get along.

I’ve got to figure out what to tell my family about all of this. I can’t keep it a secret for much longer, if for no other reason than keeping secrets would only make me guilty of the very things that bother me most about Carrie. But I don’t want everybody losing their fucking minds over this until I can give them some more concrete explanations. They’re going to have all the questions I do, and probably a few dozen more, since there’re five of them to account to. What the fuck did I get myself into?

It’s been almost a week of following Carrie around. It’s obvious she must make it look like she works from home, since she rarely goes out. Her face’s healed enough that she could appear at workwithout too many questions. But she goes next to nowhere. The few times she has, she’s tried to give me the slip. I’m positive she knows I’m out there watching her. She just hasn’t spotted me yet.

I’ve been able to keep track of her, though. Right now, I’m pulling into the grocery store parking lot four lanes over from her. She’s not shopping in her neighborhood, which makes me wonder who she’s trying to avoid. Is it Jacek, Bartlomiej, or somebody else, or a whole slew of people?

You rarely drive this far to this kind of grocery store just for the sake of coupon deals or quality. I give her space as she gathers a shopping cart and starts making her way through the aisles. I’ve grabbed one, and inevitably, I’ll have to buy shite I don’t need and don’t want. Otherwise, it’ll look strange for me to be walking around the grocery store without a single thing in my hands. The key will be to only buy a few things so I can go through the express lane and finish checking out before her. If I don’t finish before her, she really will give me the slip.

I watch the things she purchases. They’re all in a quantity for one. Nothing makes me think she lives with anybody else or frequently has anybody else over. She’s undercover, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t in a relationship of some sort for the case, whether it’s a friendship, a romantic one, or a situationship. She’s not having people visit her, at least not for meals.

It’s a quiet day in the store. When we get to the cereal aisle, I peek down the ones on either side to make sure there’s next to nobody in either. This may be a stupid decision, but I’m going to confront her because this is as neutral a spot as we’re probably going to find.

I inch my cart closer to her as she pulls something down from the top shelf. She senses me and looks to her right; her scowl etched so deeply into her face I fear it might stick that way.

“Shane, not here, not now.”

“Good morning to you, too.”

“I’m serious. I didn’t want you in my apartment, and I don’t want you here.”

“Oh, but I think you did want me in your apartment, and I think you would want me here if you could. Actually, I think you do want me. We just can’t.”

“Stop. Somebody could hear you.”

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