Chapter 27
TENLEY: There’s a live, laugh, love sign in their kitchen. That’s enough to send someone to Guantanamo, right?
REN: No
TENLEY: Well, it should be
COLE: When I said I wanted updates on what you find, this is NOT what I meant
TENLEY: Sounds like a you problem. Bygones
Hadley sighed as she set her phone down. If she’d known how this whole evening was going to go, she never would’ve asked to be included on the Breaking and Entering Group Chat Ren had set up for them.
Tenley’s main sense of amusement seemed to be annoying (or robbing) men, and so far, despite Ren’s multiple warnings that she needed to get in, get the job done, and get out, she was still walking around Stella and Eric’s house without a care in the world.
“Everything good?” Stella asked with a concerned smile.
They’d told Stella and Eric that “Emma’s” sister was in labor across the country and that they’d be getting occasional updates by text throughout the night. It was the only explanation they could come up with for why they’d be so rudely interested in their phones during dinner.
“All good,” Hadley said. “My brother-in-law just thinks he’s a comedian.”
“He’s not,” Cole grumbled.
They were about an hour into their little dinner-party-as-a-cover-for-breaking-and-entering-fact-finding mission, and the whole night had been one bad vibe after another. In fact, it was easier to talk about what wasn’t going wrong versus what was.
First of all, the food was perfect. Everyone’s perfectly scraped plates could attest to that.
And while Tenley’s updates weren’t always (or ever) relevant to what they needed, Eric and Stella didn’t seem to think the frequent text messages were too weird, given their cover story.
Stella was also delightful. The way her eyes sparkled when she told a story was adorable, and her tinkling little laugh made Hadley a little self-conscious of her own guttural belly laughs, but she didn’t hold that against her.
It wasn’t Stella’s fault that Hadley laughed like a chain-smoking long-haul trucker.
But that’s where the good stuff ended.
Cole’s vocabulary had been reduced to that of a Neanderthal, and the glare he’d been leveling on Eric all night, plus the way he always placed himself between her and their neighbors like a human shield, was really starting to annoy Hadley.
His level of alertness was hanging over the room like a giant black cloud that was going to rain down on their heads at any moment, and it was fraying her nerves.
And Eric? Just as bad. He was matching Cole glare for glare.
But Hadley cut him some slack because Russian sleeper agent or not, Eric was a guest in her home.
Well, not her home. More like her government-issued safe house.
Still, though, this was supposed to be a party, for fuck’s sake.
Did spies never have to attend social gatherings as part of a mission?
Based on these two stiffs, it certainly didn’t seem so.
By the time dinner and dessert were done and they were all settled in the living room with coffee in hand and a platter of cranberry shortbread cookies (homemade, thank you very much) on the table between them, Hadley decided she was sick of the mission.
She’d asked every fact-finding question she’d discussed with Cole beforehand, hadn’t found anything particularly useful, and figured it was time to make normal conversation.
TENLEY: These people don’t have a junk drawer. That’s un-American. Guantanamo?
REN: Tenley, I swear to God
TENLEY: *winky emoji*
Cole glanced down at his phone, then pinched the bridge of his nose, seeming to quietly gather his strength.
“So,” Hadley began, “tell me about how the two of you met. I want all the romantic details.”
Eric and Cole both sat up a little straighter. It wasn’t a question either of them had anticipated because the answer wasn’t likely to provide any good tactical data. Cole looked confused as to why she’d asked, and Eric looked like he was trying to figure out her angle.
Suck it, super spies!
Stella beamed at her, obviously thrilled to discuss her own personal love story. She leaned forward, setting her coffee on the table. Hadley mimicked her posture, wanting the details every bit as much as Stella wanted to give them.
“Well, I moved to this neighborhood about eight years ago. I’d been through a nasty divorce that took forever, so I was super excited to be in my own place.
I immediately went to the home improvement store, then stopped by that little market in town—you know the one that bakes their own bread in house? — for some wine.”
Hadley did know that market because she’d bought all the supplies for this dinner there. The smell of fresh baked bread had literally drawn her in by the nose like a cartoon character. She nodded. “I love that place.”
TENLEY: Whoa. Lube drawer. LOTS of lube. And something that I think is for butt stuff. I’m not sure. Won’t touch it just in case.
REN: Stop it! Just do your damn job!
Cole looked down at his phone again, choked a little on the sip of beer he’d just taken, and frowned mightily. Hadley had to bite down on her lower lip to stifle a laugh.
Stella, oblivious to the fact that a thief was going through her lube drawer, grinned. “I loved that market, too. Until one of the workers in the produce department followed me to my car, badgering me for a date.”
“Gross,” Hadley said, wrinkling her nose.
“I thought so. Until this big, strong looking, ridiculously handsome man I’d never seen before popped up out of nowhere and told the guy to get away from his wife.”
Stella shifted her eyes purposefully over to Eric, whose cheeks reddened. “The guy wasn’t taking no for an answer. Not from her, anyway,” he mumbled.
Hadley’s romance novel loving heart grew four sizes. “Aw, you pulled the my wife card! How romantic!”
“Right?” Stella agreed, eyes sparkling, while Eric made a disgruntled noise in the back of his throat.
“After that, the produce guy wandered off, realizing he’d been hopelessly outclassed.
And this big lug—” she playfully smacked Eric’s shoulder “—tried to nod his head at me and excuse himself like he hadn’t just done one of the most romance-novel-hero things ever.
But of course, I wasn’t having it. I invited him to the coffee shop next-door for a drink on me as a thank you.
We ended up sitting there and talking for two hours.
Then he came over the next day to hang my new curtain rods and help me paint my bathroom.
By the time my bathroom was the prettiest shade of sage green you’ve ever seen, I knew I was going to marry this man. ”
Hadley sighed. “That’s beautiful. And what about you, Eric? Did you know right away that Stella was The One?”
Eric relaxed right before their eyes as he looked down into his wife’s smiling face. “I knew before she said a single word to me,” he answered quietly.
Tears sprang to Hadley’s eyes. Damn it, there was nothing like a good love story to ruin a girl’s mascara.
She glanced over at Cole, expecting him to be watching Eric with the same narrow-eyed, suspicious glare he’d worn all night.
So, imagine her surprise when she found his gaze fixed on her instead.
And the heat and intensity in that gaze…
Phew. Was it hot in here? It felt hot in here.
But as was customary for her luck, the moment didn’t last long. When Stella turned the conversation back her way and she was forced to recount the fake story of how she’d met “Clark,” Cole’s eyes iced over and he shifted back into secret agent mode.
She took a moment to feel sorry for herself about the loss of hot, passionate Cole in that moment.
And another moment to feel jealous about how quickly Stella and Eric had known they were meant for each other.
Meanwhile, all she had was a one-night-stand agreement that had ruined her for all other men.
TENLEY: Jackpot! Hidden room in basement.
REN: Be careful. Look for trip wires and traps.
TENLEY: What kind of amateur do you take me for?
REN: Just. Be. Careful.
TENLEY: *dancing dots*
Hadley held her breath as she waited for Tenley’s reply and Cole deftly picked up where she’d left off in their cover story. The more she sat here staring at Stella’s glowing face and Eric’s smitten smile, the less she hoped Tenley would find anything.
Please just be a bomb shelter or hidden wine cellar or something. Anything other than a room full of evidence that’ll make Franklin dance a jig of glee.
TENLEY: I got it. Lockbox full of fake passports. Address book written in code. Files full of what looks like Russian intelligence. Sending pics now.
Well, shit.
Being a super spy sucked ass.