Con Man: Complete Series Box Set: A Bad Boy Romance (8 page)

I
woke up slowly
, and for the first time since the museum theft, I didn’t feel like I'd been dragged out of a swamp. I looked around and was grateful to see that my unplanned visitor had already shown himself out. I hadn't even stirred, which said a lot about how deep I'd been sleeping. I appreciated the fact that he'd just gone without a word. Some women might've found it humiliating or offensive, but I just took it as him understanding how things were between us.

That was good. I didn't do the hook-up thing often, but I really didn't like the awkward morning after shit.

I glanced at my clock and realized I’d woken up about ten minutes before my alarm. Nice. I hated weekend alarms worse than the weekday ones.

I took my time getting up. It was nice not to have to rush for once, and I felt like that, combined with my fresh eyes from a full night’s sleep, would help get me places.

Normally, I didn’t go into the office on the weekends, but normally I wasn’t trying to beat my coworkers to the punch on a case that could potentially end up with my childhood crush facing heavy jail time. After all, the standard sentence for someone convicted of this sort of thing was twenty-five years, and I just couldn't do that to him.

I dressed casually and was out the door in about an hour, warm piece of toast in hand. I nibbled at it lazily, feeling both alive and lucid for the first time in days.

I should've known things were going to go to shit.

I was almost to the subway when I felt a prickle at the back of my neck. Turning around, I scanned the area, trying to find what was setting off that primal instinct that most people had. The one that said something was off.

As far as I could tell, none of the people around me were staring me down or sizing me up for a purse snatching. Shrugging, I continued on my walk, senses now on high alert.

I was aware that this was usually the point where a woman would shrug and say it all must have been in her head, but I trusted my instincts more than that. They were part of what made me such a good agent.

The feeling didn’t go away for the rest of my short commute, confirming that I didn't just imagine it. I forced myself to keep my head facing forward and ran through my various options. The worst thing I could do right now was to repeatedly look back. It would either agitate my stalker and incite them to act, or it could chase them off before I could find out why I was being shadowed.

Instead, I stuck to short glances at reflective objects as I made my way up the stairs to the sidewalk, pretending I was none the wiser. Unfortunately, I couldn’t catch a glimpse of my pursuer during any of the brief opportunities, but I knew he was there.

Depending on how persistent my pursuer was, they would either make the mistake of trying to follow me into the FBI offices, or sit outside and wait for me to come out – that was, of course, if it was someone looking specifically for me.

And there was no way in hell I’d sit around the office, just waiting to come out and do this dance again.

I pulled my cellphone out, took stock of everything around me, and then fake tripped, sending the device skittering into the alley beside me.

I made a flustered sound and followed after it. The moment I was out of view of the street, I ducked behind a dumpster and pressed myself to the wall. Sure enough, within a minute, I heard broad but light steps at the entrance of the alley.

Whoever it was paused, and I forced myself to resist the temptation to jump out at them. I needed to be patient. They just needed to come a little closer…

My shadow took a cautious step into the alley, no doubt concerned as to why it was empty. Then he took another step. I waited a few more breaths until he took a third and final step before I struck.

I rushed him, charging with my shoulder thrust forward. I hit him in the chest and knocked him back a few steps, throwing him off balance. He was bigger than I thought he'd be, but I knew I could still handle myself.

Then he straightened to reveal all six and a half feet of the con artist who'd been haunting me all week.

“Bron?” I gasped, all the air rushing from my body.

He was even taller looking in person, and his lean form filled out what I recognized as a designer coat. This was him. My best friend. My Broderick.

My Bron.

We stood there for a moment, the years weighing heavily between us.

And then he was kissing me, his mouth hot and hard against mine, years of unspoken feelings, of things lost coming together. It was everything I'd dreamed it would be. It made me feel desire, need...safety. Nothing could hurt me if Bron were here...

No.

None of that was real.

What was real was that I was a federal agent investigating a crime that this man had committed.

Although I wanted nothing more than to stay in his arms, let him continue to kiss me, touch me, I knew I couldn't do it.

I pressed my hands against his chest and put a little distance between us. “Bron, what did you do?”

“What I had to,” he whispered, his face clouded over with guilt and sadness.

He pressed his lips to mine once more, a gentle, almost chaste kiss. Then he turned and fled. He scaled the tall fence at the end of the alley like it was nothing, and I just stared after him, watching him disappear yet again.

I'd heard that history was doomed to repeat itself, but I’d never dreamed that its looping would be able to break my heart.

Again.

C
ontinues
in Con Man Book 2. Turn the page to keep reading.

I
stood there
, unable to move, unable to put together a coherent thought. Only his name –
Bron
– echoed in my mind, a single repetition. My lips still tingled from where his had been just a second ago, first in the fierce sort of claiming that came with unfulfilled passion, and then in the sort of chaste kiss that I'd dreamed of as an adolescent, hiding the crush I'd had on my best friend.

Meanwhile, he was running away.

Seeing him haul himself over the fence snapped me back to the world of the living, and I gave chase. I grabbed the fence and hauled myself up and over faster than I thought possible. Heart in my throat, I twisted over the top and barely managed to land on my feet on the other side. I had a moment to be grateful that I never wore heels to work, and then I was off again.

The pounding of his footsteps echoed ahead of me, but this side of the alley was too deep in shadows for me to see him. Any other day, my long legs and hours of training could have me outpacing most perpetrators, but Bron had six inches on me as well as the benefit of adrenaline that came with being chased.

I caught a glimpse of him as he turned coming out of the alley and put on an extra burst of speed. It was morning rush hour, and I knew the streets would be packed with people trying to get to work on time. If I didn't get my eyes on him soon, he could disappear into the crowd.

I couldn’t blame him for running. If I'd been in his position, I would've done the same thing. If only he'd given me a chance to talk, he would've known that I didn’t intend to bring him in at all.

Not until I got my explanation, until I finally got the answers I'd been looking for.

I caught him throwing a quick glance over his shoulder as I emerged from the alley. His cerulean blue eyes narrowed slightly, and I knew he'd seen me. He couldn't slow down and blend in now. He had to keep running.

“FBI!” I shouted as I ran after him, shoving between people who didn't move on their own.

He made it down a single block before cutting into another alley. I was pretty sure he was hoping he could get to the end before I could see which way he turned. If my partner had been chasing him, it might've worked. She was average height, but her legs weren't even close to as long as mine. At six feet, I had more than half a foot on her. I was also counting on the fact that Bron was a white-collar criminal, an art thief who spent more time analyzing alarm systems than working out. Granted, he appeared to be in great shape, but I'd been top of my class.

I jumped over the trashcan he knocked down behind him, not letting it slow me down in the least. The benefit of him having a good twenty feet on me was that I had plenty of time to react to anything he tried to do to deter me. If I could get him caught somewhere, against a dead end, or in a press of people too thick to hurry through, I'd be able to catch him.

Except if I caught him in public, there would be no way of hiding it. I couldn't just handcuff him and hope to keep it a secret. I'd already announced who I was on the previous street. Contrary to how TV and movies made it appear, authorities pursuing suspects through the streets really wasn't a commonplace occurrence in big cities. It did happen on occasion, but not so much that no one wouldn’t notice the chase. The most I could hope for was that no one had recorded it on their phones. If they did, it would already be posted to social media.

If I handcuffed him in public, I'd have to make it official. There'd be paperwork and procedure to follow. If I tried to just knock him down or corner him, there was the chance that word could get around, and my supervisors would want to know what I'd been doing. Roughing up a witness or suspect was never looked upon highly, so there'd be explanations necessary there too.

And I didn't want to explain any of this. I wasn't even sure I could.

I slowed as the realization hit me that even if I managed to catch him, it would come down hard on both of us, fast and hard. Finally, I stopped. His frantic footsteps were barely audible, and I was fairly sure I heard the distinct screech of a fire escape ladder being pulled down. He must have jumped up to reach the edge of it. If I pursued him any further, I'd have to check each fire escape, giving him time to get away. It'd been risky, trying to grab that ladder. He must've been really desperate to get away from me.

The thought hurt more than I wanted it to.

“
Shit!
” I swore savagely, my breath coming in harsh pants. I bent over, put my hands on my knees. My temples throbbed with every beat of my heart, and I swore again. As if a mere word could somehow express the pain, frustration and loss I was feeling.

I'd let him go. Just run off into the city. A rat escaping the cat into its complicated sewer world. And if he was smart at all, he would leave as fast as he could. Leave and never look back. I'd never see him again. Never get answers. Never have closure.

At least, before, I'd had positive memories. Even the horrible course of events that had occurred to break us apart hadn't been our doing. We were innocent. Now, all of my memories were tainted by the last five minutes.

How could I have fallen for such a basic trick? A kiss! I knew I was a rookie, but I'd never thought myself an easy mark.

But he
had
kissed me. And in that moment, everything else had faded away. Surely that couldn’t have been only a desperate distraction? It had to have meant something…right?

I shook my head, trying to fight back against the dark, gaping pit of churning emotions threatening to consume me. Humans used other humans. That was the way it was. Con men even more so. Bron was one of them and had used our history together to escape.

But if that was the case, why had he followed me at all? I was potentially the only one who could ID him. A proper grifter would have fled the moment he caught wind that I was on his case. He'd hidden his identity so well for so long that I was worse than just a liability. I could expose him. Cost him his freedom.

I let out a frustrated cry and punched the brick wall, barely feeling the skin on my knuckles split against the rough surface. I didn’t know what to do. For years, I'd been the logical, hard-working woman who'd striven endlessly toward a single goal. I'd never let anything distract me, but one sighting of Bron had made me willing to risk it all. One kiss had undone me.

I wasn’t entirely sure how long I stood there, the same thoughts repeating over and over again, but eventually, I put my hands in my pockets and walked back the way I came. I wouldn’t be early for work now, but that didn't matter.

I'd reached a tipping point. I knew that. This whole situation was plummeting quickly, completely out of control, and gaining speed at that. I had decisions to make, and what I decided would irrevocably change not only my life but Bron's as well. Both of our futures were in my hands now, and I didn't know what to do with either of them.

I
pressed
my back against the wall of the empty apartment I'd just broken into. Well, more like let myself into rather than broken. The window had already been shattered. I'd just knocked out some of the jagged pieces before climbing in from the fire escape. I was absolutely certain that I’d lost Karis, but I was still on edge.

For a moment there, I'd been so close to losing everything.

I slammed my fist against the wall, silently cursing as anger and frustration bit at me. Why had I kissed her? I was smarter than that.

But the way she stood there, her lips parted in surprise, cheeks flushed. Her light blue-gray eyes so full of recognition and questions, beckoning me closer. I'd been in love with her for so long, I'd been unable to stop myself.

My fist unclenched, and my fingers went to my lips before I could stop. I could still feel her pressed against me, the outline of her mouth so lush and warm compared to my own. That first kiss had been borderline intoxicating, and for a moment, the whole world had fallen away. I'd felt the sort of hope I thought I’d forever lost the night my parents died.

Of course, reality had kicked in, and I'd allowed myself the momentary indulgence of a soft, chaste kiss before I bolted. Everything after that came in regret-stained flashes. I remembered scaling a fence, running through an alley, and pushing into a crowd. Into another alley, climbing a fire escape. At first, I'd felt her presence not too far behind me, but as I'd gone up the ladder, that feeling had disappeared.

I didn't hear her now. No doubt she was returning to the station to set up roadblocks, then gather reinforcements to start a manhunt with a shit load of back-up. I was basically a captured man. I was going to have to run right now. No money, no clothes, no passports. I'd have to start all over again, completely from scratch.

Except...

The moment she saw me, there had been some surprise on her face, but something else too. Something off. Now, I remembered how she'd always looked on her birthdays and Christmas, when she'd been shocked by a gift she wasn’t expecting. Seeing me for the first time should have had the same effect, at least. Or more. Maybe I only wanted it to be more.

Unless she'd already known.

I sank down to the floor, needing to catch my breath. Was it possible? Could she have known about me before our unexpected rendezvous in the alley?

Karis was smart. She always had been. If I'd left a single clue, she would've been the one to find it.

But if she'd known about me before the alley, why weren’t the FBI hunting me down? Why had things at the FBI still felt like they were in the investigation stage then?

Was she keeping me a secret from them?

The thought made me feel sick, but I couldn’t help also feeling a bit of hope that she was indeed trying to save my skin. One, for the whole not going to prison thing, and two, her risking her career for me had to mean something, right? That she still remembered me, felt some connection to what we used to be? That I hadn't imagined the connection when we kissed.

I shook my head. It was all conjecture anyways. I had no proof one way or the other of Karis’ intentions. All I knew was the best thing I could possibly do for her was stay away. After all, if she was hunting me down, a little distance would be prudent. And if she was trying to run some subterfuge from her bosses, maybe it would be better if I didn’t give her too many things to hide.

No matter how much I tried to pretend that I didn't care about anyone, I didn't want her to be hurt.

I sighed and pushed myself to my feet. I needed to figure out my next move. Just how far should I retreat? Should I leave the city? The state? Did I have enough time to get some shit together?

My burner phone rang, interrupting my internal debate. Pulling it from my pocket, I saw it was Leticia.

Shit.

It was Monday. I'd completely forgotten. I had a very complicated long con that I was supposed to be concentrating on. How could I be such an idiot? I'd told myself that checking out Karis had just been a weekend distraction while I waited to take the next step with Leticia. But seeing Karis up close, kissing her, had made me completely forget that anything else existed. Including my next criminal venture.

I'd just added a whole new layer of complicated to my life that I just didn’t need.

“Oh hey!” I answered, forcing as much enthusiasm as I could into my voice. “I’m on my way. Is something up?”

“Not at all. I just wanted to make sure you were able to find directions.”

I faked a laugh. “I think so. If this map from the internet is at all reliable. I’m not really familiar with your section of the city.”

“I thought so.” She managed to not sound
too
patronizing. “Listen, there’s been a small change in plans.”

“Oh?” I looked up at the stained ceiling, pressing my thumb between my eyes. I wasn't in the mood to deal with it, but I kept my tone neutral. No point in ruining the whole thing if I didn't know what I was going to do next. Who knew, Leticia might come in handy if I ended up needing to run.

“Yes. Today, I’ll have you work at the studios I mentioned, but afterwards, I would like you to move to a more peaceful, quiet location where you can really grow as an artist.”

Maybe this was my answer. I tried not to hope as I kept up the charade. “Are you sure? You haven’t even seen my work.”

“I just have a feeling. I’ll explain the rest at the studios.”

“Whatever you think is best. Thank you again! I’ll see you in a bit.”

“Be safe! Text me when you’re on your way, darling.”

“Will do.”

I quickly hung up and took a deep breath. I needed to go pick up the supplies I'd squirreled away for this very involved grift, then actually get things moving. It would help purge Karis from my mind and hopefully keep me safe.

I had to keep moving if I wanted to survive.

I'd lived this long without her. It wasn’t like I couldn’t do it again.

I hoped.