Bad Boy's Honor: An MMA Bad Boy Romance (73 page)

Neither of us wanted to go into work that day, but I had a meeting at four that I just couldn’t miss. I’d rescheduled it enough times already. Once more and we’d lose a big client.

I told Chloe to stay at the apartment, although she wanted to come into work with me. That wouldn’t have been a good idea; she was practically glowing from the session we’d had in bed this morning. And the one just after lunch. If we went into work together like that, everyone in the office would know exactly what we had been doing.  

Not that I was all that subtle myself. It took a real effort not to walk around with a big, stupid grin on my face, and when people said ‘hello’ I immediately replied with a cheerful greeting that was completely unlike my usual grunt.

It sounded cliché, but I definitely had a spring in my step. I was less stressed, and I went hours without thinking about Roddy Barton. This attitude wasn’t conducive to killing someone.  

The client meeting flew by, but my good mood led to me giving away some incredibly generous terms that meant we would lose money on the deal for the next year. I needed to stop coming into work after sex with Chloe.  

How did happy people ever get any work done?

Chloe sent me an email to tell me she would be cooking dinner and asking if I wanted to come by. I hadn’t finished sending my response when another email came through, this time with a picture attached that made wish I was there already. It was a bit risky to use the work account for those sorts of images, but hey, I was the boss after all.

Chloe tasked me with getting the wine, but other than that, all I had to do was show up. I wanted to leave immediately, but we were closing out the end of the month at work and loads of employees were staying late. It would hardly send out a good message if I left at five.

I decided to stay until six, but not a minute later. I could fake a conversation on my phone as I walked out the door to make it sound like I was heading to a dinner meeting.

The minutes ticked by at an agonizingly slow pace. At one point, the time stayed the same for so long that I went to restart my computer thinking it had crashed. What was the point in being the boss if you couldn’t leave whenever the hell you wanted?

Chloe was probably still cooking, anyway. I’d have to wait until after dinner before I managed to strip those clothes off and have my way with her. She’d better not be a slow eater.

I couldn’t stay until six. I just didn’t have the willpower. I picked up my jacket at five forty-five and headed towards the door.

Then the phone rang.

My first thought was to ignore it, but it could be Chloe with an update on dinner. Or telling me to get round as soon as possible for an appetizer that hadn’t been on the menu.

No such luck; it was James.  

If I hadn’t seen Dad recently I would have ignored the call, but Dad’s mood had me worried. He was acting rashly, jumping at shadows all the time and overreacting.  

I picked up the phone to answer the call. My instincts told me this wasn’t a conversation to have on speakerphone.

“Hey Jimmy,” I said. “I was actually just on my way out.”

“I won’t keep you long. Hey, is Chloe with you?”

“No, she’s left already.” And she’s waiting for me, wearing a pair of pink panties that left nothing to the imagination.

“Good. Listen, I have information. About Chloe.”  

“What about her?”

“I’m going to tell you, but you have to promise not to overreact.”

“Asking me not to overreact just makes me think you’ve done something worth reacting to. But you’ve caught me in a good mood, so just tell me.”

“I had some people watch her,” James said. “Some of our men.”  

“What do you mean, ‘watch her?’ ” I asked. It sounded like they had been peeking at her in the shower, but that clearly wasn’t it. “How fucking dare you watch her. She’s my employee. This is my company, not yours or Dad’s.”

“We screen all new employees, Denton,” James said calmly. “And something about her didn’t sit right. Her résumé came directly to me for one thing, even though my email address wasn’t on the job listing.”

“Perhaps she phoned and asked who to send it to. She’s organized like that. She didn’t just pluck your email out of thin air.”

“No, I’m sure she didn’t. Someone told her. But that’s not the problem. Like I said, I got suspicious, so a few of my team started following her around. They’re subtle so she wouldn’t have noticed.”

“You’d be surprised what she notices,” I said. “She’s brighter than the average assistant.”

“That’s because she’s not an assistant.”

“I can assure you she is. It says so at the bottom of her emails and everything.”

“Christ, Denton, be serious for once, would you?”

“You haven’t given me anything to be serious about yet.”

“Denton, she’s been lying to you. Right from the very beginning. Her name’s not even Chloe Tamworth, although I don’t know what it is.”

“How convenient. Anything else? You going to tell me she’s not a natural blonde as well, because I already know that. Carpet doesn’t match the drapes, if you get my meaning.”

“You’re sleeping with her?” James asked.

“Of course I’m sleeping with her. You’ve seen her. How could I not be?”  

That’s the sort of answer I would usually give. Lighthearted, casual, like it was just sex. That’s all it was. So far.

“You need to end it,” James said urgently. He sounded panicked now, scared even.  

“No way. Now, if there’s nothing else…”

“Chloe’s an FBI agent, Denton. She’s been working undercover spying on you this entire time.  

I laughed. Then I stopped. Then I laughed again.  

There weren’t many other possible reactions when someone tells you that Chloe was an FBI agent. I couldn’t think of anyone less capable of being undercover agent. Perhaps ‘capable’ wasn’t the right word. Chloe had proved herself to be intelligent, and I wouldn’t put anything past her, but there was still no way she was working for the FBI.

Impossible.

“You need to take this seriously,” James insisted.  

“Yeah, sure James, I’ll take it seriously.”  

Then I saw something that I did take very seriously indeed. My phone flashed up with an email from a contact I had placed in charge of watching Roddy.  

We should close out this deal tonight, or the other party’s going to walk. They’re a tough negotiator, but we can definitely do a deal if we move soon.

Shit. Shit, I needed more time.  

“James, I have to go. Something urgent has just come up.”  

“Think about what I said, Denton,” James warned as I hung up the phone.

We should close out this deal tonight, or the other party’s going to walk
meant that Roddy was leaving town soon and I had to act now.  

They’re a tough negotiator, but we can definitely do a deal if we move soon
meant Roddy’s team was armed, but we could still take them.  

So much for a nice dinner with Chloe.

I had to take care of Roddy. Chloe would hate me, but I could win her back round. This was more important. I couldn’t let Roddy escape. Not after what he had done to Kara.

I pulled out my keys and unlocked the top drawer of my desk.  

I hated guns, but they served a purpose. I slipped it under my jacket and left the office.  

The next time I saw Chloe, Roddy would be dead and we could start fresh with no baggage.  

I smiled one final time, before getting serious. FBI agent? What had James been smoking?

Apparently an upskirt picture of me in my damp panties wasn’t enough to get Denton to come to dinner on time. I should be mad, but the overriding emotion was desire. The longer he made me wait, the more I’d want to jump him the second he walked through the door.  

That was probably the entire point. I bet there wasn’t even an urgent conference call he had to lead. He probably just wanted to tease me and make sure I was slick with wetness when he finally came over.

I’d only given him one job, and that was to buy the wine. Guess I had to do that myself now. The food still needed another thirty minutes in the oven. That was more than enough time to pop over to the liquor store across the road and grab a bottle of red. It would be a lot cheaper than whatever Denton would have purchased, but I was used to cheap wine, and it was his own fault for bailing on me.

I ran outside, quickly crossed the road and purchased a bottle of red wine. It barely took five minutes. As I crossed the street on the way back, I noticed a familiar face.  

It was her; the woman I saw outside the office a week or so ago. Why on Earth would she be outside my apartment? I’d assumed she was following Denton, but there was no way she could know he was coming here tonight.  

Lois might have put a handler on me to make sure I didn’t get too close to Denton, but if this woman was an FBI agent she needed a lot more training on how to tail someone effectively and without them noticing. She was also too pretty to be undercover tailing someone. Every man who walked past gave her a second glance, and then a third.

For the time being at least, I was an FBI agent, and that meant I should have the confidence to approach someone who appeared to be following me.  

She looked away as I approached the entrance to my building, but I went straight past the door and walked up next to her.

“Excuse me,” I said politely. “This probably sounds a little odd, but I could swear I know you from somewhere. Did you go to school at St. Thomas in New York?” I had no idea if there even was a St. Thomas school in New York, but that wasn’t the point.  

“No,” she replied, and suddenly looked like she would rather be anywhere else but here with me. She tried to move away, but I kept alongside her.  

“Are you sure? What’s your name?”

She paused before answering. “Ashlee Williams,” she said uncertainly, as if it were the first time she’d ever said it. It probably was.

“I’m Chloe Tamworth,” I said. I wanted to see if she recognized that name. If she did, I would know she had been sent by Lois, because not many people knew me by the name Tamworth.  

I got a reaction from her, but it wasn’t the one I was expecting.

“You’re Chloe
Tamworth
?” she asked. “
Tamworth?
”

“Yes, why?”

“Nevermind. I, uh, I need to be going. Nice speaking to you.”  

She pushed past me and half walked, half jogged down the street, checking over her shoulder to make sure that I wasn’t following her.

That was weird to say that least.

I headed back upstairs and poured myself a glass of wine, even though according to Denton’s message he wouldn’t be here for another hour at least. I needed something to calm my nerves. That confrontation had left me more on edge than I cared to admit.

My cell phone--the real one--rang from my bedroom. That likely meant it was either Lois or my mom. I wasn’t sure which was worse, but when I saw it was Mom calling I relaxed slightly, so she must have been the lesser of two evils right now.

“Oh wow, you answered your phone,” Mom said before I could even greet here.

“Hi Mom. I’m actually kind of busy right now. I’m cooking dinner.”

“By cooking, do you mean microwaving?”

“No, I’m using the oven and gas stove and everything. I don’t want to get distracted and burn the food.”

“What are you making?”  

I read the name of the recipe from the website directions that I was following religiously. “Fresh pasta with a pesto sauce, and bruschetta.”  

“That’s fancy,” Mom remarked. “What’s his name?”

“Whose name?”

“The man you’re cooking dinner for. I don’t believe for one second that you’re doing all this for yourself. I assume you have a date tonight.”

“He’s just a friend, Mom.”

“If you say so dear. I’ll let you get on with it. I only called to see how you were getting on, but it sounds like things are going well.”

Mom was just about to hang up when I called her name. There was something I wanted to talk to her about.

“Can I ask you a question?”  

“If this is about what underwear you should wear tonight then I’m probably not the best person to ask. It’s been awhile since I’ve needed to--”