Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
A.J. rolled up to Grant Walker’s place later that afternoon. Ana had been a champ the entire trip and didn’t request a pee break but once, nor did she complain that they survived off gas station snacks for food on the way down.
When they were forty-five minutes away from his friend’s house, A.J.
stopped at a Piggly Wiggly to grab groceries.
He didn’t want to risk being seen out in public in his small town.
Even though the townsfolk kept secrets from outsiders better than most, he wanted to avoid questions as to why he was staying at Grant Walker’s house instead of with his family.
Grocery shopping with Ana had felt normal somehow. Easy. Like they were a married couple, quibbling over which brand of milk or flavor of chips to buy.
They’d loaded up their cart with all the essentials, including wine and beer. He didn’t normally drink on the job, but if he was going to be alone with Ana, they needed something stronger to drink than sweet tea or Coke.
After their impromptu roadside chat that morning, they’d mostly spent their time in the car fighting over the radio controls while avoiding serious conversation.
Ana had shored up her walls shortly after giving him a glimmer of hope she might be ready to open up.
Still, he was satisfied he’d made some progress with her.
Sooner rather than later, though, he’d need her to reveal more and trust he was there and with her for the right reasons.
“Not bad for a hideout.” Ana opened the SUV door, stepped outside, and stretched. “And you said this place belongs to an Air Force buddy?”
“Yup.” He came around the vehicle on the circular driveway to stand alongside her and eyed the house.
“Six bedrooms. Nine bathrooms. Infinity pool, pond, and hot tub out back. Plus, a hangar for his bird. Not too shabby.” Maybe he’d even have a place like this someday.
Probably half the size and without a helo out back.
“I never understood the idea of having more bathrooms than bedrooms.” She smiled and pointed to the bed of pink flowers in front of the gray-bricked home with a wraparound porch. “Pretty flowers.”
“They better be. Camellias. Alabama state flower.” He motioned toward the side of the house where a three-car garage was located. “I should park and get the groceries inside.”
“Don’t want the ice cream that’s surrounded by the two bags of ice you bought to melt.” Her lips teased into a fuller smile.
“Nothing comes between a man and his ice cream.”
“Sure you don’t mean a kid and his ice cream?” She winked, and he resisted the urge to slap a hand to his heart.
By some miracle, Alabama was already doing her thing and loosening Ana up.
“But, um, did the Air Force get a pay increase I’m unaware of? I’m thinking the Bureau should do the same.”
He set a hand on top of the warm hood of the SUV. “One of our friends started a bourbon business a few years back, and Grant used some of his inheritance to invest in the company. Let’s just say I’m regretting my choice not to buy in.”
She tugged at the bottom of her yellow tank top as if trying to coax a breeze. “Looks like the heat wave followed us here.”
“Nah, the heat wave was born in Alabama.” He pointed to the trunk. “And that ice cream—”
“Is about to die a quick death.” She kicked the tip of her shoe at the driveway. “Who from your team is coming to Alabama?”
He hadn’t planned on revealing the fact some of his teammates would be arriving soon for backup should they need it, but the woman was worse than a bloodhound.
“It’s fine. I’m not too keen on the idea of involving more people, but I take it you all are a packaged deal?” She crossed her arms while waiting for a response she clearly already knew the answer to.
He cocked his head and smirked. “It’s almost as if you got a thing against ice cream, distracting me with conversation, so I don’t go rescue it from melting.”
“I’ll admit I’ve never been a fan of anything sticky. I hate when it gets all over my hands as it drips down the side of the cone.” She scrunched her nose.
“Now I’m thinking you’ve been eating your ice cream wrong.” He opened the driver’s side door as she came over to stand beside him, shielding her eyes from the sun to view him.
“You haven’t answered my question,” she reminded him.
Yeah, well, she went and distracted him with thoughts of licking a little chocolate off her hand. Putting her finger in his mouth. Sucking it clean.
Damn, his dick was gonna get as hard and stiff as a pole if he didn’t get his head on straight.
He sat behind the wheel and restarted the engine.
“Not sure who you met last year or if you remember them,” he began, “but Wyatt decided to stay in D.C. since his wedding is coming up soon.” His smile broadened.
“So, it’ll be Chris, Finn, Roman, and Harper heading here.
Harper was planning to stay in D.C., but she decided it’d be better to have someone watch over us down here in case we need a quick digital assist with anything. ”
“The women are the brains behind your work, huh?”
“We’re not so bad ourselves, but thank God for them, that’s all I can say.” When his phone rang from where it was positioned on his dashboard, he sighed. “The bags of ice and ice cream are gonna be as good as gone if they bake out in this heat much longer, even with the A/C running.”
“How about I bring the SUV into the garage and unload the groceries, and you handle the call?”
He snatched his phone and hopped out. “The key to the door is under the third rock to the right in that flower patch over yonder. You can open the garage door once inside.” He pointed to the flowerbed and brought his phone to his ear.
When Ana was out of earshot, he answered Wyatt’s call. “We’re here. Good timing.” Minus the ice cream issue. “Any news?”
“Ana’s still not on the FBI’s Most Wanted list. Not yet, at least. Feds have searched her home and are going through her phone records, though,” Wyatt replied, knowing full well that was what A.J.
was asking. “Her unit is definitely tossing her name around as the potential mole, especially since she’s the newbie on the team.
Plus, I guess something about her background is not what it seems, and we’re not quite sure what that means yet.
But all of this isn’t exactly going to do wonders proving her innocence.
” Wyatt paused as if regretful at the news he’d delivered. “Running doesn’t help, either.”
“Not really running,” A.J. defended, trying to shirk the concern about Ana’s background now creeping into his mind. “And for all the Feds know, she could be missing, same as her sources and Porter.”
“It is shaping up to look like the Volkovs, not the SVR, hired The Huntsman to kidnap Katya in New York, which means they may be behind the disappearance of the other sources,” Wyatt said. “Well, that’s what our contact at the Bureau told Natasha, but we need to do our own digging.”
“Shit, okay. I’ll let Ana know.”
“The guys and Harper should be setting up in Birmingham by nightfall,” Wyatt added.
They didn’t have a safe house there, so they’d need to rent a place. “You sure they don’t want to stay here?”
“And if I say yes, you’ll kill me. You know you want a chance to spend time with Ana. Hell, you wouldn’t shut up about her on the way to the airport Saturday night.”
Hence the drunken call. “I hit my head. Plus, I was intoxicated. Bad combination.”
“Sure, sure. So, you’re not risking our necks because you got feelings for the woman?” Natasha chimed in.
“Am I on speakerphone?” A.J. lifted his sunglasses a touch and cocked his head, his eyes glued to the scene before him.
Ana, in those tight white pants, sashaying toward the flower patch.
Fuck if she didn’t have a gorgeous body.
He let his glasses go, brought a fist to his mouth, and bit down on his knuckles as she bent over to grab the key from beneath the rock, the snug fabric stretching across her perfect ass.
She must have felt his eyes on her because at the moment, instead of getting back up and going to the front door, she held her position and slowly turned her head to peer at him from over her shoulder.
“Yes, you are,” Natasha answered as A.J. stepped back and turned to the side. He needed to be stealthier.
“Hey, I’m not risking your necks. This was my choice. If something goes wrong, it’s on me. Not y’all.”
“That’s not how we roll, and you know it,” Wyatt said as Ana finally climbed the steps to the wraparound front porch. “And Luke and Knox will be arriving in D.C. soon. They’ve been apprised of the situation.”
“Is Luke pissed?” A.J. asked, closing one eye as if he might get punched in the face and part of him wanted to see it coming.
“I’d say Luke took it better than Knox did when he learned the news that Adriana is friends with Ana and kept the truth from him.”
His expression relaxed at Natasha’s words.
“Well, considering Knox kept a few secrets from her, I’d call it even.
” Ana going to the trouble of keeping A.J.
from discovering she was in D.C. meant one of two things in his mind: she hated his guts, or she was so attracted to him that it scared the hell out of her.
He hoped for door number two since fate, as fate tended to do, intervened and brought them together.
“And what does Admiral Chandler have to say about all of this?” That was the dicey part. Now that Natasha was working with them and reported directly to her dad, it was all a bit . . . yeah, dicey.
“He wants you to find out what Quinn may know about the Daylight Ledger and key. But the admiral said if we’re wrong about her, and she’s a traitor and a threat to national security, he’ll arrest me himself for aiding and abetting a fugitive.
” A.J. wasn’t sure if Natasha was kidding or not.
Her dad wouldn’t really arrest her, right?