Page 47 of Wicked Sin

And the walls go up. She glares at me. “What the hell was that?”

I hear the rudeness. But I also still hear the way she said my name.Luke.

Danger, danger.

I shake my head. “Nothing.”

She touches her mouth. Her glorious, fuck-me-I’m-so-dead mouth. “You kissed me.”

She kissed me first. But she’s free to do that, and I amnot. I stick with clarifying that it was a two-way kiss. “You kissed me back.”

Pacing into the living room, she shakes her head. “This cannot happen.”

I follow. “That’s supposed to be my line. Obviously, it was a mistake.” I scrub my hand over my face, a useless action which does nothing to reach the weird and inappropriate feelings swirling inside me right now. “I need to call the captain back. Talk to her about getting a map of who knew what, and when.”

“What?”

“Your point about the FBI knowing you were in D.C.. That’s a good one. We need to follow up on that.”

“Oh.” She goes still for a moment then nods. “Right. Yes. Do that.”

“We’re not done with—”

She laughs. “The mistake? Yeah, no, we’re done with that.”

“The conversation.” I give her a tight, controlled smile. “We’re going to be stuck together for a few days, though. Let’s pace ourselves.”

“Sure. Whatever you want.”

I usea burner phone app to call the Captain from yet another encrypted number.

“Hello again,” she says after I introduce myself. “How’s vacation going?”

I leave out the fight—and the kiss it lead to. “We need to consider the angle that whoever left the note at the safe house expected Taylor to be there, or arrive there soon. As in, they didn’t know she was in Washington.”

“Unless the point was to spoil the safe house,” Woods says, musing it over. “But I hear what you’re saying. The leak maybe wasn’t internal to the FBI.”

“Who else was looped in? The Secret Service?”

“Yeah, I believe they got a heads up on the safe house. But Ferdinand and I kept your travel plans tight.”

“Well, that narrows down our list of leak suspects, doesn’t it?”

“It sure does.”

“Ferdinand should be relieved that the loose lips aren’t on his own team.”

“I’ll be sure to point that out.”

“Thanks. You’ll let me know if they bump up the forensics report?”

“You got it.” She ends the call. And I go hunting for my houseguest.

I need to spend the next thirty-six hours entertaining her in a more appropriate way than throwing my tongue down her throat.

I find her curled up in the window seat that overlooks the backyard—such as it is. There’s a covered deck and a small pool.

“Can I go swimming?”

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