Bounty (7 page)

I
haven’t been back
to see her. Not since that crushed look on her face. Since I had her in my arms, my hand on her hot, throbbing pussy, my cock nudging against her folds…

I don’t know how I can ever go back. Instead, I’ve been holed up in my apartment, typing up reports of the intel I already have, poring over the details, sending everything to Vicente once it’s organized. I only leave my place to buy Thai takeout and hit the gym.

As I hunch over my desk, typing away in the pale blue light of my laptop, I’ve been trying to convince myself that it’s a strategic step back. I’m not hiding out of guilt. This is the right move: I’ll use what I’ve gotten so far — the bugs in the shop, the GPS sticker on her iPhone — and get as much info as I can before re-assessing and re-engaging if need be. What I have so far is a really good start – the tracker chip lets me watch her every move (yes, creepy), but ideally I would have actually nabbed her phone for a little while, enough time to download all the information she has on the cloud — her flights, her locations, her account information. It would be a treasure trove, having my hands on her iPhone.

That was the original point of showing up at her shop, before I got derailed…

At least I got a tap on her landline. And I struck gold, there. The phone appears to be her main (perhaps only) source of communication with her father. I overhear everything she says to him, and it’s definitely Devlin Sullivan. They use a lot of euphemisms, but I’ve gotten a fairly clear idea of how he launders some money through her shop. It’s clear this isn’t his most efficient way of laundering, but it makes sense for him to have diversified. If any single shop goes under, or falls under suspicion, he can always funnel funds through one of the others.

The fact that it’s his own daughter blows my mind. How could he put her at risk like that? Make her complicit? Or is he, like many criminals, simply delusional?

It’s clear that I need to learn more about the man himself. Listening in on his conversations with his daughter… it’s been enlightening. He remembers small details she tells him. He’s attentive. Thoughtful.

Fuck it,
he’s a good father
. The most notorious gangster in the city is a good parent.

Better than my parents, even.

It doesn’t make any sense. Too much contradictory information. But so it is.

I write everything down that I hear. Information on deals, brokers’ names, buyers’ names and locations, which may or may not be code. All gold, as far as the FBI is concerned, even if they have to hire a team to figure out what it all means.

And, whether she’s fully aware of it or not, a lot of it is pretty incriminating against April. I want to withhold that part, but I can’t. Vicente is all over me, reading my reports as soon as I send them, sending notes, asking questions. April must know more than is made clear in the phone calls. And there must be more information on where “on God’s damn green Earth” Devlin Sullivan actually
is
. It’s hard to convince Vincente that I don’t know. As far as I can tell, Sullivan is even keeping that information from April, who seems just as frustrated as I feel. I can hear the vexation in her voice, and can picture the way her brows furrow in frustration, the seething tone when she’s pissed but is trying to control herself. I weirdly love that expression on her.

For fuck’s sake. I’m supposed to be paying attention to my mark, not his hot daughter. This isn’t
important.
I’ve got to be able to stick to the case without getting emotionally entangled.

“I have to figure out how to dig in deeper,” I’m telling Vicente on the phone. “Especially after rejecting her in her shop.”

Yes, I had to tell him the details of what happened. It’s part of the understanding of the mission — that while most of this is
highly
illegal and off the books, I have to keep Vicente, if not the FBI as a whole, apprised of the situation.

“Why the fuck did you do that, anyway? You should have just fucked her, kept her swooning over your cock. Jesus, Copperhead,” Vicente chides me. “Is this your first rodeo or what? You fucked this up in two weeks already?”

“Maybe I just don’t want to tell your ugly ass about it,” I say, but he’s right. I fucked up.

“Go charm her.
Again
. And stop fucking it up,” he tells me. “Position yourself as the good boyfriend. Who knows, maybe she’ll just invite you to meet her father. If you guys get serious.”

I scoff. “That could take a while.”

“A whirlwind romance isn’t unheard of,” Vicente says, sounding utterly sarcastic. “Get her hot over you, and then pop the question.”

“It’s actually not a terrible idea.”

But the thought of spending that much time with her, getting that close with her… the thought of her tight little pussy being mine night after night… only to betray her? It feels low. And yet, it’s also excruciatingly enticing. The pussy part, not the betrayal.

“No shit,” Vicente says. “Get in, get deep. You have three months left.”

It’s insane. This is the kind of shit I usually excel at. Digging in, getting deep, and getting out. This is my
job
. I don’t normally
care.
So why does it feel so different this time?

Doesn’t matter. I have to meet up with her again. I have to enact plan hand-in-marriage. I just need to sack up and deal with the fallout when it happens, instead of backing off to spare her little feelings. There’s a lot of money at stake here. Life changing money.

“Solid copy, Vicente.”

This is what I do for a living. This is who I am.

I told her I wasn’t good people. I can’t help if she didn’t listen.

I
don’t want
to just show up at her shop again — that’s what I did last
time and it didn’t go well. Well, maybe it went
too
well, actually. But trying that same ploy again would be pushing my luck.

It’s a piece of cake to wait until her GPS movements are hurtling down the highway to the gun range, and to hop on my motorcycle and beat her there. I make sure to set up in the stall next to the one we went to on our first dat e— she won’t be able to see me immediately, unless she’s being nosy, but I will be able to hear her, watch her shots.

A few minutes later she arrives. I can tell it’s her by the stamp of her heavy boots, the way her keys jangle. I know her so well, already, but half of the time I’ve “spent” with her was just me eavesdropping on her in her personal space with illegal surveillance hardware.

Jesus.
You’re an asshole, Copperhead.

Craning my neck around the divider between her space and mine, I find her deep in concentration, lining up a shot. She’s still, and perfect. Holding her rifle, oblivious to me, I get to watch her for a few moments before she sees me. But it’s hard to watch. She’s just….

I force my eyes off of her.
Get a grip, Copperhead
. I’m here to bring a criminal to justice. Not ogle at the way the sunshine breaking through the rainclouds hits her hair.

I step up to the firing line, parallel to her, and sight up my pistol for a shot.

She’s got to notice me now.

BLAM, BLAM, BLAM! I peg the target, twice between the eyes and once between the legs. That’s her move.

“Liam?” I can just hear her voice over my ear muffs.

I turn to her.

“Oh, hi April.”

“Liam!” Her mouth gapes in surprise and she lowers her gun and flips on the safety in one fluid motion.

Her green eyes are huge under the magnification of the safety goggles.

“You’re a woman of many safety goggles,” I say, tapping my temple gently.

“What are you doing here?”

“I just wanted to talk to you.”

“So you stalked me to my shooting range?”

“I just knew you’d come here eventually to blow off steam.”

“How long were you waiting?”

Shit.

Instead of answering, I draw closer to her. Her breath catches, just a moment. In fright, or anger, or lust, I can’t tell.

Then her mouth sets, and her eyelids lower. An eyebrow arches above her right eye, and she glares up at me.

I never thought about how small she is. She fills every room she enters, but she’s chest-height at best.

“Do you like me, or not?” she asks. She’s a real straight shooter, point-blank. And I know, in that moment, that the answer is an unequivocal
yes.
I more than like her. I like her
way
too much for this mission.

“You’re trouble,” I say instead.

“And you’re an asshole.” She leans her gun against her shoulder and makes a smart about-face. “I’m done letting you jerk me around. I’ve had enough.” She marches to the back entrance of the check-in building, away from me.

“April, wait.” I follow.

“You either like me or you don’t,” she says, spinning quickly to glare at me. “It’s a simple question.”

Except that it doesn’t have a simple answer. And I’ve got to explain my behavior in a way that doesn’t let her know what I’m doing, but might also win her back.

“It’s not simple. Yes, I do like you.”

Her mouth twists to the side in a dissatisfied smile.

“I’m sensing a but.”

“
But
,” I continue. “I know you just broke up with your fiancé. I know you’re having a hard time. And I’m afraid I’ll hurt you.”

“Why would you hurt me?”

“Because people close to me get hurt.”

She suddenly stalks forward, and pokes a finger hard into my chest. “Let me tell you something, tough guy. Yes, I might be a mess right now, but that doesn’t mean I can’t make decisions for myself. And I don’t appreciate you acting one way one second, and the opposite the next, all in the name of
protecting
me. Just tell me the truth and let me decide what is and isn’t too ‘dangerous’.”

If only I could just tell her the truth.

“I have a history of fucking things up when it comes to fucking,” I say. “And I like you
too
much.” That, at least, is true. “I don’t want to move too fast.”

“You like me so much that you aren’t attracted to me and don’t want to have sex with me?”

“FUCK that, April. You
know
I want to fuck you,” I grab her hand, still poking into my pecs, and press it against my cock, which is hard for her. I’m hard just being in the same
room
as her.

I let go of her hand.

“But that doesn’t mean I think it’s a good idea.”

“Everyone’s always trying to tell me what is and isn’t a good idea,” she says, shaking her head. “I’m so
sick
of it.”

She walks back through to the shop before I can stop her, and I obviously don’t want to have this conversation in front of the podunk-hick guy at the counter. I follow her out.

“Stop
stalking
me, Liam,” she says, wrenching open the door to her car.

“Then stop walking away.”

“I already can’t get you out of my head.”

“And I can’t get you out of mine.”

She finally stops messing with the car door and looks up at me. Her don’t settle in any one spot, instead they flick across my tattoos, to my rough hands, to the pistol at my hip.

“I haven’t felt this way in… a long time,” I say. I don’t know where this is coming from. “Not since my parents were still alive, and I was dating my high school girlfriend.”

“Your parents died?”

“Yeah,” I say. “My mom first. Then my dad just kind of… faded.”

“Mine too,” she says. “My mom, when I was ten. Car accident.”

“I’m so sorry.”

Her eyes close in remembered pain, and she leans against the car. I spin to lean against it, too, and she lets her head drop to my shoulder.

“My dad kind of faded, too. Into his business, anyway.”

“How do you mean?”

She tenses up. That same way she did last time she mentioned him.

Devlin Sullivan.

Could his own daughter be afraid of him, too? He sounded like a good father on the phone. What does she mean he “faded’?

“I’m not supposed to talk about it.”

“That doesn’t sound very healthy,” I counter.

“Well. He’s really… particular. I think because of what happened to my mom. It was so sudden.”

“Yeah,” I say. “My dad got really secretive, too. Like he had to protect me from his grief.”

“Yeah,” she says. “That’s exactly it.” She turns her luminous eyes on me. “Did yours get pushy, too?”

In so far as he pushed me to become a bounty hunter. “Yes.”

“Yeah. Dad’s always checking up on me. Helping me. But then also, making me do stupid shit. Like that party.”

“Which, you still need a date to, right?” How could I have forgotten about the party? If I can just get her to like me (
love me
pops into my head but I stuff it back down) in time for the party, I may get to meet the host himself.

“I’m not going,” she says, but she smiles.

“Sure,” I say.

Her head against my shoulder is warm.

All it takes is confessing things to her to get her to confess things to me. I guess this is the shit they call “trust.” I’ve certainly never felt it with anyone I was fucking, before.

I’m not really fucking her, though. But god how I’d like to.