9. Eva
EVA
I stare at my wrist and rub the pad of my fingertip over the area that hasn’t stopped tingling for two damn days.
A frustrated huff that slips through my lips, my eyes wandering back to my laptop screen where I try to make sense of Dmitri’s latest job request. Maybe if my brain wasn’t wrapped so hard around the memory of Wolfe’s hand gripping my wrist, I’d be able to focus.
My phone buzzes on the desk next to me and I gasp, startled. I stab the accept button when I see my brother’s name flash across the screen.
“E.” I sit up straight and hold the phone tighter against my ear, the lightness and ease in his tone almost as jarring as the fact that I still feel Wolfe’s hand on me. “You’re not going to believe this.”
I close my laptop. “What?”
“Those guys. The ones who’ve been coming around?”
My stomach drops. “What about them?”
“They won’t be back. It’s over.”
I narrow my eyes at Wolfe’s burner phone. “What do you mean, it’s over?”
“I got a call this morning. The debt is paid. All of it. Some anonymous payment was made through a business account they’ve never seen before. They said the balance is zero and they won’t be back to collect anymore.”
My mind blanks for a long second. I don’t say anything. I just hold the phone and let his words marinate.
“E? You there?”
“Yeah.”
“Forty-two-thousand dollars. Somebody just paid it. Like it was nothing.” He laughs. The real one. The big, bellowing, full, room-filling one I haven’t heard in months. “I don’t know who did it and honestly, I don’t care. I can finally breathe, E. For the first time in over a year.”
“That’s great, Sal.” I try to keep my voice normal even though he’s completely glossing over the fact that this insanely large payment was made from an anonymous source as some gesture of goodwill.
Like that’s not any more concerning than owing all that cash to the guys who’ve been threatening him in the first place.
I cover my face with my hand.
Sweet Jesus.
“Come by tonight. I’m making something ridiculous for dinner. We’re celebrating.”
“I’ll be there.”
I drop my phone on the desk and collapse against the back of my chair.
Forty-two-thousand dollars. Anonymous. From a business account nobody recognized.
Wolfe.
He said he’d take care of it. I thought that meant he’d make some calls, maybe find some leverage or an angle to work.
I did not think it meant someone would drop forty-two grand like it was pocket change.
Who the hell lives above a dry cleaner, eats Cheerios for every meal, and has forty-two-thousand dollars to throw at a stranger’s debt?
I pick up the burner phone, then put it down and stare at it.
My pulse kicks against my throat when I pick it up again.
I want to call him and ask if he did it.
I want to call him and scream at him for doing it.
I want to call him and say thank you so hard it cracks my voice.
But I don’t do any of those things. I put the phone down and sit with it, the way I sit with everything that scares me… turning it over in my head until I can see all the sides and all the motives.
Because I’ve learned my lesson. I’ve missed glaring red flags when I let my emotions consume me. I can’t let that happen again.
I press my fingertips to my temples and rock back and forth.
Someone is taking care of the person I love most. Without being asked. Without expecting credit. Without even telling me it was done.
That’s either the most generous thing anyone’s ever done for me, or the most effective manipulation I’ve ever seen.
And the fact that I genuinely can’t tell which is the part that keeps me sitting at this desk while my heart does something I don’t have a name for…
and honestly, I don’t think I want a name for it.
Because knowing what it is means I’m acknowledging it, and that freaks me the hell out.
Dmitri texts me at noon. He’d given me instructions for a new job that I’ve been researching for the past couple of days and he said he wants an update. He never texts me details or questions about jobs. Those are reserved for in-person meetings, like the one we have scheduled for today.
The target for his latest job is Ashford and Crane, a consulting firm in Back Bay. He wants their client roster, billing records, and internal communications related to a specific project.
But this time he wanted something else…a specific person’s calendar for the next two weeks. When I heard that, it chilled my blood.
That isn’t simple data collection. That is tracking a person…where they’ll be, when they’ll be there, who they’re meeting with.
I check the knife in my jacket before I leave to meet him. It’s still there.
Always there.
Our meeting will be held sitting on a bench in the Public Garden this time.
A shiver licks the back of my neck at the sight of him.
It’s broad daylight and there are tourists everywhere.
I shouldn’t feel panicked, but seeing Dmitri sitting with his legs crossed reading a newspaper like a man who has nowhere to be and nothing to worry about is fucking unsettling because underneath that bullshit facade lies a hell of a lot of danger.
“Eva.” He folds the paper when he sees me approach. A smile stretches across his face.
“The calendar,” I say, not bothering to mince words. “That’s new.”
“Is it a problem?”
“I didn’t say it was a problem. I just said it was new.”
He studies me, his cold blue eyes moving across my face like he’s trying to see what’s churning behind my expression. But fuck him if he thinks I’ll give it away.
“I know this is a big job. Now that you’ve had time to do some analysis, how long will it take you to finish?” he asks.
I bring a hand to the back of my neck and squint up at the sun. “Two days and you’ll have everything.”
He nods, then hands me a flash drive. “Two days will work well. Here are the details for where the data needs to be sent.”
I take it, willing my hand to steady itself as I pocket the drive. My leg muscles twitch with the urge to flee this spot immediately, if not sooner. But Dmitri isn’t ready to let me go just yet.
“You seem different lately,” he says, stroking his chin.
I swallow hard. “Different how?”
“Less tired. More alert.” He tilts his head. “Almost like something in your life has improved.”
I don’t move. I don’t blink. I don’t breathe wrong.
Because how the hell could he see that?
“I’m sleeping better,” I say with a shrug, trying like hell to sound nonchalant. “I got a new mattress.”
He watches me for another two seconds and my heart damn near stops. Then the smile comes back. “Good. A rested mind does better work. And I have much more for you to do.”
I back away.
“Eva.”
I stumble over a stick on the path behind me and steady myself before I fall onto the concrete.
“How’s Sal?”
I tug the back of my ponytail. “He’s fine.”
“Good. I heard the restaurant is doing well. No more trouble with the neighbors.”
The air is all but sucked out of my chest.
He knows. He knows the debt got paid. He’s telling me he knows, the same way he tells me everything…like it’s small talk instead of a lethal threat wrapped in a fake ass smile.
“No more trouble,” I say.
“Wonderful.” He picks up his newspaper. “Thursday.”
I turn on my heel and hurry away, careful to avoid the stick because I can’t bear the thought of being in his airspace for a hot second longer.
And my fucking hands are shaking before I’m past the swan boats.
He knows. That means he’s watching Sal closely enough to know that the Albanian situation changed. Which means he’s watching everything. Which means whatever Wolfe did to pay off that debt, Dmitri noticed.
I need to tell Wolfe. Now.
I text the burner from outside his building. No answer.
I wait five minutes, then text again. Still nothing.
For the next ten minutes, I pace the sidewalk trying not to look like someone who’s pacing a sidewalk when a black Honda Accord pulls up to a parking spot in front of the building. I turn as the door opens and Wolfe gets out of the driver’s seat.
My breath hitches.
I almost don’t recognize him.
He walks around the front of the car and sweeps a hand through his damp hair.
I have to keep my teeth clenched to hold my lips together.
He’s not sporting his signature band shirt layered over a long-sleeve t-shirt look.
He’s not wearing a coat or his glasses. Just a dark gray wife beater with sweat stains, a pair of basketball shorts, and Jordans.
His skin is flushed a deep pink, and he’s breathing like he just ran five miles, fought someone, or both.
I almost choke on a breath as my eyes trace over the ripped biceps his layered look has been keeping from me.
Sweet Lord.
I’ve been filing this man under “nerd with a laptop.” Glasses, Cheerios, messy hair, taps his thumb when he’s stuck. Clark Kent. Safe. Cerebral. The kind of guy who fights with binary code, not his hands.
But the man standing in front of me right now is not that guy. His shoulders are broader than the band shirts let on. His arms have definition that doesn’t come from typing. And his knuckles on both hands are red and raw, the kind of raw you get from hitting something hard enough to leave marks.
There’s a scar on his left forearm that I’ve never seen because it’s always been covered. And I spot another one just above his collarbone that’s smaller.
Holy shit.
Looks like I need to re-categorize him.
Actually, I need to come up with an entirely different system to process all of this.
“You’re staring,” he says.
“Y-you’re half naked on a public sidewalk,” I sputter, scanning the street behind him out of habit. Nobody watching. No cars I don’t recognize. “What am I supposed to do?”
“I was working out.” He pulls his glasses out of his pocket and puts them on. The Clark Kent mask slides back into place, but it doesn’t fit the same way anymore. Not now that I’ve seen what’s underneath.
And I’d like to see it again. Very soon.
“Working out,” I repeat. “Working out where? There’s no gym in this area.”
“There’s a MMA gym where I meet my brothers. Not too far away.”
“A boxing gym?”