Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Ty pulled into Lydia’s driveway at five o’clock on the dot, surprised that he was a little nervous. This was certainly a new experience. Preparing a meal with a beautiful woman wasn’t something that he did.
More often than not, he was tracking down leads or still sitting at his desk at Headquarters when the rest of DC was worrying about dinner. But things had gone well while he and Lydia ate lunch together at the park. He wanted to capitalize on the positive momentum and keep it going.
Getting out, he grabbed the paper bag off the front seat and headed up her walkway, considering it a huge step in the right direction that she was about to welcome him into her home.
She opened the front door before he could knock, dressed in denim shorts and a simple black V-neck T-shirt, sending him a small smile. “Hi.”
He smiled back. “Hey.”
“Come on in,” she said, stepping out of his way, smelling great as usual. Her hair was damp, and her face was makeup-free. She was gorgeous whether she wore the stuff or not.
“Thanks.” He moved into the entryway, taking a moment to toe off his sneakers as Top 40 music played through an excellent speaker system.
“Thanks for grabbing dinner.”
“No problem.”
She took the bag from him, leading the way down the short hallway to a bright and airy open-concept space. “Make yourself at home.”
“I appreciate it,” he said as he studied the kitchen’s white quartz countertops and cabinetry, big island, double ovens, stainless steel appliances, and pretty backsplash.
His gaze moved to the sturdy oak table with seating for six, to the cozy living room with its plush, creamy couches and navy-blue accents, leafy plants, a gorgeous white-brick fireplace, and neutral laminate flooring throughout the large room.
Then he noticed the amazing three-season porch off to the right. “This place is great.”
She beamed as she nodded. “I love it. I don’t ever plan on leaving.”
“I can’t blame you.”
She set the bag on the counter. “Um, can I get you something to drink?”
“I wouldn’t mind some water.”
“Sure.” She opened a cupboard, then went to the fridge. “Do you want ice?”
“Nah, that’s okay.”
She pressed the glass against the fridge’s dispenser, then handed it to him. “Here you go.”
“Thanks,” he said, sensing that she wasn’t entirely comfortable as she crossed her arms, then quickly uncrossed them again. “So, how can I help with dinner?”
She stood on her tiptoes, peeking into the bag. “Um, you can wash and cut up the peppers. It looks like you got onions and mushrooms, too.”
He nodded. “I got a little bit of everything. We never covered what you do and don’t like.”
“I’m pretty easy. I can’t think of a whole lot that I don’t like.”
“Except chicken feet.”
She grinned. “Except that. It’s safe to say we have that in common.”
He chuckled, thrilled as hell that she sent him another unguarded smile—her second of the night. “I’m happy to dive in.”
She set him up with a cutting board and a knife not far from the five-burner cooktop, as he washed the red, yellow, and green peppers.
He brought the vegetables over to the counter, recognizing the pretty flower arrangement from Marney’s place on the dining room table. “I like your flowers.”
She looked to where he did. “Thanks. My mom liked fresh flowers on the table. She always bought something new every week.”
“They’re pretty,” he said again, deciding that there was no need to bring up her family’s tragedy when they were still getting to know each other.
She nodded. “So, what are we doing with the salmon?”
He shrugged as he sliced into the red pepper. “Pan-fried certainly works for me, unless you’re thinking of something different.”
She shook her head. “That sounds fine, but I have to be honest and say that I don’t cook a lot of fish. I’m afraid I might ruin it.”
“Do you want to switch? You can handle the veggies, and I’ll take care of the fish?”
She nodded. “Sure.” She moved to his spot and got to work, slicing her way through the red pepper like a pro as he took the half pound of wild-caught salmon from the bag. “The pans are in the cupboard to the right.”
“Thanks,” he said as he opened the cupboard door and crouched down, perusing his options, noting that she owned top-of-the-line cookware.
She went after the yellow pepper next. “Do you do a lot of cooking when you’re in DC?”
“Some, but usually I’m at work.”
“Do you always do undercover stuff?”
He grabbed two fourteen-inch pans, one for the vegetables and the other for the fish. “Not always. If I’m not undercover, I work bank robberies.”
“Oh.” She met his gaze as she grabbed the green pepper. “And you’ve always done that?”
He shook his head. “I’ve always worked in violent crime, just in different aspects. I spent my first four years out in LA on a gang task force.”
She winced as she started slicing. “That sounds like it could be scary.”
He nodded, opening a cupboard to the left of the microwave, looking for her selection of oils, grabbing a bottle of the organic avocado. “It had its moments.”
“What is a task force, exactly?”
“It’s a group of law enforcement agencies that work together. I worked closely with the LAPD and the DEA. It wasn’t uncommon for the US Marshals to get involved, too, especially when we ran raids.”
She started on the mushrooms. “Huh. But then you moved to DC?”
He nodded as he leaned against the counter, watching her work when there wasn’t much that he could do for the moment. “They transferred me three years ago.”
“Do you get a say in where you get transferred to?”
He shook his head. “Not really. Agents go where they’re needed and assigned. I’ve been lucky to get big cities both times.”
“What’s it like to work on bank robberies?”
“It can be intense, especially when you know that they’re patterned and violent, and it’s only a matter of time before the unsub strikes again.”
She shook her head. “Unsub?”
“Unknown subject. Sometimes it’s more than one.”
“Got it.”
“I don’t know if you remember that string of robberies a couple of years back on the west side of DC…”
She nodded, pausing to look at him as she finished the last mushroom. “That was horrible. Those poor tellers who got killed.”
He nodded this time as he turned on the front left burner, then added a splash of oil to the pan. “It was pretty bad. I was lucky to be on the task force that brought those fuckers down.”
She made quick work of cutting up the onion, combining the slices with the mushrooms in a bowl. “How did you get involved with the undercover stuff?”
He grabbed the bowl, dumping the onions and mushrooms in, listening to them sizzle. “Some of the agents I worked with out in LA and up in DC did the undercover ops for the task forces I worked on. It seemed interesting, so I volunteered.”
“Huh,” she said again, leaning her hip against the counter, now that the prep work was done. “You mentioned at lunch that you went to undercover school. Do they teach you how to act and stuff?”
He grinned as he added the peppers to the pan, then twisted the salt and pepper grinders several times. “Not quite. I spent a few weeks back at Quantico unlearning how to act like an FBI agent.”
She frowned. “What does that mean?”
“Criminals can spot a cop a mile away. I needed to remember how not to look like one. The way we scan rooms and carry ourselves. Stuff like that.”
“Oh.” She moved to put the cutting board in the sink. “What kind of undercover stuff have you done? If you’re allowed to tell me.”
He nodded. “I’ve done some murders for hire and gone under for a few of our bigger drug operations.”
She paused with her hand on the faucet. “Murder for hire? Like a hitman?”
He stirred the vegetables before he looked at her. “Yeah.”
Her eyes grew wide. “You pretend you’re going to kill people?”
He nodded. “I wear a wire while someone tells me how they want the murder to go down. Once I have what we need, the team arrests them.”
She stared at him—more like scrutinized him—as she frowned. “You don’t look like a hitman.”
“What does a hitman look like?”
She shook her head as she shrugged. “I don’t know. Uglier and much more violent, I guess.”
He laughed, thoroughly enjoying their conversation, not minding it at all that she had a million questions as they tried to figure each other out. “I let myself get pretty scruffy, and I wear different clothes. My black leather jacket makes me look pretty tough.”
“Interesting,” she said as she turned on the water and wiped down the counter. “So, you spend a lot of your time pretending to be someone you’re not.”
He shrugged. “I spend my time being who I need to be to get the information that I’m looking for. Going undercover is a fact-finding mission.”
“What if there aren’t any facts to find? Like in my family’s case?”
He raised his brow at her.
She raised hers back. The challenge was there in her eyes for him to see. There was definitely a sassy side under her sweetness.
“If there’s nothing to develop, they’ll most likely pull me. There are other cases they can put me on.”
She nodded. “It sounds like you’ll want to pack light when we head up north because they won’t be keeping you there for very long.”
He grinned as he stirred the vegetables again, then turned on the pan for the salmon. “I guess we’ll see.”
“I guess we will.” She washed her hands, then moved to one of the cupboards to grab two plates. “So, when we go to Massachusetts, are you going to use a different last name? I feel like I’ll need to take notes about what I can and can’t say.”
He shook his head, setting the salmon in the pan for a good sear.
“With this situation, I won’t be full deep cover.
I mean it when I say that this is a quiet inquiry at this point.
Usually, I keep my first name, and we change up everything else, but for this operation, we’ll fiddle around with my home address and education—get me a Virginia driver’s license, give me an exercise and sports science degree, and a personal trainer certification.
In fact, they just finished my website today. ”
She frowned. “You have a website?”