Chapter 6 - August
The second Grayson kills the feed he’s reviewing, I know something’s wrong.
“Audio went silent two hours ago,” he informs, his fingers flying over the keyboard. Monitors glow blue in the darkened bunker, casting harsh shadows over his face. Camera footage loads, and he runs through it.
My gut hardens. “Devices fail all the time. Dead batteries. Malfunctions from temperature, dust, moisture, software glitches. Electromagnetic interference.” I reel them off like I’m trying to convince myself this operation hasn’t gone to S.H.I.T., and the Romans aren’t onto us already.
I leave my desk to stand beside his and wait for the verdict. “You think someone saw us break in and tipped them off? Swept the place?”
“Let’s review footage right before the first mic went dead.” He types in something, and the cam planted in Kate’s bookcase loads.
6:55AM. She and the dog are curled up sleeping. The alarm goes off at seven sharp, and she slams her palm on it. The dog rouses, gets up and sniffs. Grayson fast forwards to where the dog dances around on the bedside table and knocks over the damn lamp and scratches off our mic.
“That little twerp!” He yanks off his headphones, tosses them on his desk, and scrubs a hand over his stubbled jaw.
“Fuck.” I pinch my forehead. “Play the rest.”
We jump through various cameras and get the gist of what happened. Kate told her housemate, who played nonchalant with the story, but once her friend left for work, turned into Espionage Spice and ran a signal sweep with tech she stashed in the attic.
“Wasn’t expecting that.” Grayson leans back in his chair, lips flattened into a defeated line.
“Where the fuck is Katar?” I growl. “He’s supposed to be watching her!”
“Right here.” Concrete scrapes as he shifts the brick he uses for a doorstop.
He always secures the bunker door open. Easy exit. He doesn’t like confined spaces or feeling trapped because the Romans locked him in a padded cell for refusing to join them.
“Nice of you to show up on time,” I bark.
Footsteps tap down the stairs as he joins us. “Had a little unexpected delay.”
The throbbing in my temple picks up pace. “What kind of delay?”
“Nothing I can’t handle, boss.” He pulls up a chair and settles in, Allgoal riding boots kicked up on the desk. He shoots the doorway a final glance, then slides out one of his blades, polishing the blood from it with a pocket rag.
Grayson drags the skin under his eyes down. Failure doesn’t mix well with an overachiever complex. I thump him on the back.
Katar nods at the screen displaying the pile of bugs on the counter. “And I thought the unicorn was just for decoration.” He whistles like he’s impressed.
I fold my arms. “This is the handiwork of your friend.”
“Murder Spice did that?” Something akin to pride stretches his mouth. “I knew she was good news.”
“Don’t you mean bad news?” Grayson tugs at his hair.
Katar’s feral grin widens. Bad is good to him.
I cut him off before he goes on a tangent. “What’s our next move?”
Katar points his now clean knife at the screen. “Recruit her to the team. She’s got sharper instincts than half the Shadow Lake Police force.”
I slash my hand through the air. “Not happening until we know if she’s Team Roman.
Kate’s bodyguard.” My arms cross. Lockdown mode, like all our active investigations.
This just turned priority URGENT. “They’re both more dangerous than we thought.
I want to know how the fuck Murder Spice knows how to sweep and where she got the tech. ”
Katar’s predator switch flips, and he sheaths his weapon. “With pleasure.” He cracks his knuckles, slowly and deliberately, pleased he’s been given rein to unleash hell.
Grayson scratches his forehead. “What if we try something radical and befriend Kate? Talk to her. See what she knows. You know… like humans do.”
My jaw ticks. “I don’t befriend targets. Period.”
He raises two palms. “Hear me out. I’ve been listening to them for three days straight and learned a lot about them. They’re not Romans. Unless their new strategy is to become romance addicts who break down your festival flirt-fest, hedge bets on how big your dick is, and give it names.”
Goddamn fiends.
Katar doesn’t miss a beat and lowers his legs and leans forward. “Please tell me it’s something monstrous, like Broodzilla.”
I glare at Grayson for giving my enforcer ideas. “I will end you both.”
Grayson perks up and winks. “If you’re trying to intimidate me with that brooding jawline, just know it only fuels the fanfiction.”
My lip curls. “Burn all the bug footage. Now.”
Grayson shrugs. “Too late. They’ve already catalogued everything about you, given you a backstory, and assigned you tropes. The only question is, what role are you playing?”
These girls will put me in an early grave before the Romans do.
Katar draws out a red licorice candy from his breast pocket. “Which one is he? Morally gray antihero with a tragic past? Broody reformed mob killer who bakes?”
They both burst into laughter.
Assholes are getting kicks out of this. “Do I look like I own an apron?”
I don’t have time for fun. We need to salvage our mission before more damage is done.
I pinch the bridge of my nose to ease the headache forming. “Can we stay focused and devise a plan on how to deal with the Kate mess?”
Grayson sighs like we’re out of other options. “We can’t plant more bugs.”
Goddamn, PJ3 blew our cover. Last time I give that pipsqueak jerky.
Grayson throws up counting fingers. “Our alternatives are that we spy from afar with a parabolic microphone. Pay someone else to get close to her. Hijack her phone and pray she always has it close.”
I tick off the first. “Those mics are unreliable and don’t pick up everything.” I address the second. “Pay someone else? And trust they won’t spook her or sell us out the second they figure out who she is? Not a chance.”
Grayson exhales loudly.
To the third. “We’re flying blind if she leaves her phone in her bag, the battery’s dead, or it slides between the sofa cushions.”
My jaw works slowly and bitterly, coming to the conclusion that I’m back to square one—befriending.
“Kate won’t trust me,” I say flatly, but the idea of being closer has something old and forgotten stirring in me. “And this isn’t a game.”
“What else have we got?” He taps his bench.
I don’t like it. Not because it’s a bad strategy, but because it requires proximity…
and that gets people killed. I made the call a long time ago not to get close, not after what it cost me.
Despite what I tell myself, I’m already close.
Too close. I inserted myself into her panic spiral.
We need intel, and she’s the chaos that threatens my control.
“Kate Williams is a liability and distraction I don’t need,” I mutter.
Katar slides out of his seat to press two fingers to my pulse. “There’s a heartbeat. He’s alive. Shall I call it in?”
I swat him away. “Touch me again and you’ll need an ambulance.”
Grayson picks up a stress ball and squeezes it. “If you don’t want to play nice and make Kate’s dreams come true with the forced proximity trope, why not hover outside her house or window like a constipated gargoyle?”
I want to wipe the smirk from his face.
I come back to his proposal. Years on the force taught me to get close. Undercover narcotics, gangs, undercover ops. You don’t come back from those clean, you come back scarred.
With this in mind, I run through potential candidates for this task. Grayson is fragile. Stalking is foreplay to Katar. That leaves me. Fuck.
I rub the back of my neck, scraping the regret away as best I can. I’ve worn many masks in my time. Cop, thug, vigilante. What’s the harm?
“I’ll do it. But only if we know exactly what we’re dealing with first. What else have you found?”
Grayson lights up like a switchboard. “Starting from the top.”
A flood of court documents, property filings, and filtered records spills onto the screen.
He points to the centerpiece. “Sealed court records filed in Shadow Lake District court confirm Charles Huntington is Kate’s father. Paternity suit filed by her mother. Judge ruled in her favor and ordered payments.”
I raise a brow. “Did he pay?”
Grayson pulls up another window. “Hush money payments through a shell account under the name E. Williams were deposited monthly until she turned eighteen. Under the condition never to claim the Huntington name.”
Katar tears off more candy. “Daddy issues deluxe.”
I stick to the topic. “Has she had any contact with him since?”
Grayson shakes his head. “Not that I can find. No emails, calls, or inheritance. She’s not listed on the family trust.”
Exiled as well as estranged. I can work with that.
“That’s not all.” Grayson’s in his element, calling up all the records he hacks from the court archives. “I filtered her mail records from her utility companies, banks, etcetera, and found this." A city council fine loads next to the notes recorded by the officer.
“Noise violation for nuisance dog,” I read. “I knew that goddamn neighbor was up to no good!”
Grayson loads more evidence. “He’s submitted three this year for surrounding properties.”
I’m already standing.
Grayson arches a brow. “You’re not going over there.”
“Why not?” I crack the tension in my neck. “Winning her trust is my new job description.”
Katar looks delighted. “Want me to bring the shovel?”
“I want to know what you found out about Murder Spice,” I reply.
He withdraws a pair of red silk panties from his jacket pocket, presses them to his nose, and takes a long inhale. “She’s been in an institute like me. Committed for insanity for killing her stepfather.”
I stare until he crushes the panties in his hand and tucks them away. “Don’t compromise the mission with your dick.”
Katar grins. “Relax. I can multitask.”
When he clears out to conduct recon, I’m on the warpath.
This week’s been a string of failures that have resulted in the mission slipping.
Now I’ve got to get up close and personal with Kate.
Her smile is a weapon that threatens to make my heart beat.
Her damn name is on my tongue, and I need to burn it off.
Harry, the old neighbor, made it even uglier, and I’m about to level the playing field.
I suit up in armored riding gear—black Shield jacket and matching pants, gloves, and boots. Plenty of protection if I get knocked off my bike. I ride my Lightning LS-218 and park three blocks away, out of view of cameras and this asshole’s security system.
Schuberth helmet on, I march up his driveway, too calm for the storm brewing in my chest. I navigate through his neat garden, up the porch steps, and stop myself from kicking the door in. Barely.
I make three sharp knocks and wait.
“I’ll get it,” the old man says, his footsteps padding down the hallway.
“Get out here, old man,” I warn through the wood separating us.
“Get off my property, or I’m calling the police.” His voice wavers.
Police? Cute. They don’t get involved in neighborhood disputes, except when someone is injured or uses violence and intimidation, neither of which Kate is guilty of. Me, on the other hand…
“Call them,” I growl, giving Harry five seconds before I go on. “Pick up the phone and rescind your Council complaint about your neighbor’s dog while you’re at it. We both know it isn’t a nuisance.”
“Suze,” he croaks to someone inside. Wife? Relative? Nurse? “Call the police, please. There’s a man at our door threatening me.”
I slam my fist against the door hard enough to make the frame shudder. “You haven’t seen threatening yet. Take back your complaint. Or I’ll be back, and next time, I won’t knock.”
Harry whimpers. “I’ll… I’ll call them now.”
Good.
I turn, descend the steps, and slam the gate behind me. The metal clang echoes down the empty street.
I pause in front of Kate’s fence. Her car’s not there.
She’s not home yet. It’s easier to pretend this isn’t personal if I don’t see her face.
Except her face is seared behind my eyes.
I know the curve of her lips when she bites them to stay quiet.
The flare of her nostrils when she’s about to pick a fight.
Things I shouldn’t know and can’t forget.
Fuck. No. This isn’t the mission.
I grind my teeth and shake that from my head.
On the way back to my bike, I pull out my phone and search for a contact. I’m going to call in a favor. Damage control.
I warm up my bike, and the engine hums beneath me, smooth and measured like me.
Except I’m not right now. Kate Williams isn’t just a mark. She’s not just an enemy. She’s in my head. And that’s more dangerous than any Roman I’ve ever faced.