The Spy in 3B Read online

  I was in a daze, my lips still tingling from his kiss when he dropped me in front of my apartment. “Thank you for everything.”

  His lips tipped up into a smirk. “You’re welcome. And so you know, since our date was interrupted again, we’ll be getting a re-do.”

  He leaned against the wall as he made sure I went in.

  “Goodnight, Lyra. Let me know when you’re up for the do-over.”

  All I could do was stare at his back as he stomped down the hall like he owned the place. Who the hell was Marcus Black? And had he awakened a monster?

  Chapter 3

  Marcus

  Holy shit.

  Kissing Lyra Wilkinson was like sticking my whole body in an electrical socket. The buzzing hum stayed with me as I walked back to my flat.

  I locked the door behind me, then double locked it and chained it because I wanted to make it difficult for myself when my body prompted me to go back and finish that kiss. Finish it naked. Finish it with her screaming my name.

  What the hell? Where had that side of the woman been hiding? She kissed like she was discovering kissing for the first time and really, really liked it.

  How had I not seen it before? I ran my hands through my hair and paced in an attempt to burn off some of the energy.

  You were too in your head. Now enjoy it.

  Fucking hell. She was dangerous

  I needed a clear head. She’d tried to give me that ’we should be friends’ nonsense.

  Friends? What kind of shite was that?

  She wanted to walk away. That had never happened before. Whenever I put my mind into something or someone, they all wanted to stay. But not Lyra. I might have let her go if she hadn’t kissed me.

  We needed to stop with this banal small talk and start touching more. There should be lots more touching. I’d seen her tonight, the real her, not the version she presented to the world. She was like me. Well, she was normal. But normal or not, there was a part of her she kept safe, hidden.

  I wanted to know about her life. But all those important things that I had found in my background search, she hadn’t told me any of it. Nada. It was as if she had parts of her that she was willing to share, but I hadn’t passed muster, so I didn’t get to hear it. Which was bullshit.

  Lyra and I would deal with each other later. I had more pressing questions. I lifted one of the cushions in my couch and then adjusted the tab until it stayed up and revealed the keypad beneath it. A couple of quick taps, and I was able to log in. Curtis, my handler, answered. “Marcus, it’s Friday night. What’s the matter?”

  “I was mugged today.”

  Curtis cursed. “You should have called housekeeping.”

  I grunted. “No, he’s still alive.”

  There was a beat of silence. “What?”

  “I was on a date. We got mugged by a member of Victus. I couldn’t deal with him in front of a civilian. Advise.”

  He cursed. “Where were you?”

  I gave him the pertinent details, and he was silent as he waited for me to finish. He knew if I was calling it in, something important and immediate needed to be done. The team had learned to trust my instincts. “Is my cover at risk?”

  “No. You’re clean. There is no chatter on you or your ID.”

  “You want me to believe it was a coincidence? No way. There was something about the way it happened. Like he was waiting for us. I don’t know. It just feels wrong.”

  Curtis was quiet for a moment. “Victus has all sorts of low-level minions. No need for alarm yet. Have you involved law enforcement?”

  “No. But that will be the expectation since I was with a civilian,” I muttered. The police were just going to make this messy.

  “We’ll send a team in.”

  “Fine. In the meantime, get me what you have on Victus operatives working in the States. They’ve never had a presence here, so why now?”

  “Is the civilian able to compromise you?”

  I froze. I knew what he was asking. He wanted to know if Lyra had seen me do anything out of the ordinary. Something they’d have to make her forget. “No. It was a run of the mill date. But he took her purse, so have the team ask her about it when they question her.”

  Curtis sighed. “Fine. Likely he’s a contractor passing through just getting his kicks with a little light robbery. The civilian, you vetted her?”

  Shit. “Yes. I used Hans.” Hans was our resident hacker. There wasn’t a system he couldn’t break. Other than thinking Lyra was hot, he’d found nothing remotely interesting about her.

  “Fine. Come in for a debrief tomorrow, and we’ll send a team to interview the civilian.”

  “One more thing, Curtis. He managed to hit me. He could have killed me, but he didn’t.”

  Curtis’s voice went icier. “That sounds personal, Marcus.”

  “It’s never personal. I don’t know him. He did hurt my friend though.”

  Curtis was silent for a beat. “Your friend? The civilian?”

  “Yes.”

  “Control will be happy that you’re heeding their advice.” I could hear both surprise and pleasure in the tone of his voice.

  “Well, I’m not doing it for Control. The point is, she’s a nice, normal woman.”

  “Oh, sounds exciting. Aren’t you glad you had that date?”

  I laughed. “Actually, I am.”

  Curtis’s chuckle was low. “If you say so. I’ll check on what you need to do and get back to you.”

  Maybe I was overreacting, but something was off. I didn’t know what it was, but I could feel it in my bones. I pulled up the surveillance on my front hall and kept the cameras trained on Lyra’s flat.

  She wasn’t mine. I knew that. At the same time, I couldn’t help that suspicious feeling. Like she needed my protection.

  Are you sure that’s not just you getting attached?

  No, I wasn’t getting attached. Being with her would take care of one of my problems. Control would finally get off my arse now. That whole attachments look normal, let us control your life thing. I had zero interest in that.

  What I did have an interest in was Lyra Wilkinson. And tonight she’d finally shown me a part of herself. Something real. And that real part of her was impossible to resist. And just in case I was right about the mugger targeting me, I needed to keep her safe. Because she had no idea who I was.

  And that made her a target too.

  You’ll be repeating history.

  * * *

  Lyra

  If I was being entirely honest with myself, I wasn’t sure how long I sat there against my door with my bandaged knee that had been kissed all better by Marcus Black. But eventually, I found my brain cells.

  They’d been drugged by Marcus and his kisses, but they were in full functioning order again. I stood slowly, wincing slightly as my knee smarted. Son of a bitch. That little shit Prochenko really did need a lesson taught to him.

  Stop being impetuous.

  I could practically hear Roz in my head. But this wasn’t about me being impetuous. Stannis was here. And he was here for a reason. Not to mention that now he was armed with my gun.

  I marched into the bathroom, carefully tugged a shower cap over my hair, then took a quick, perfunctory shower, wincing as the water and soap sluiced over my knee.

  When I was done, I let my hair out of the strategic bobby pins I’d used to pile all the curls to one side. I wrapped myself in a robe and then went to my bookshelf. I’d been so happy when I moved in here. Roz had set it up for me, just how I loved it. Books galore with a fantastic hidden compartment.

  I pulled my copy of Pride and Prejudice down to a forty-five-degree angle. On the inside panel of the book was a keypad on which I tapped in my code, and voilà; the shelves split apart, revealing my weapons arsenal as well as a communications portal.

  I never left the house without a weapon. Though tonight, that practice had bit me in the ass. And not in a fun, dirty kind of way I wanted from Marcus.

&nb
sp; What do you know about dirty?

  I knew things. I’d read a lot. I might not have a whole ton of practical experience, but I did like dirty books. Maybe Marcus Black would be willing to try practical dirty application.

  I rolled my eyes at myself. One kiss and my body was ready to jump on that Marcus Black train and ride it for all it was worth. I needed help.

  Inside my little weapons vault, there was a secure computer to check in with work. I did a quick check to make sure that Addie hadn’t been sent out on a mission while I was on my date. And when I saw that she was in, on site for the night, I called her secure line.

  She answered with, “Home already? That’s really disappointing, Lyra.”

  “Hey,” I muttered petulantly. “Who said it was disappointing?”

  “Honey, it’s not even midnight.”

  “So?” Okay, yes. That was sad.

  “Are you calling me with him in your apartment?”

  I sighed. I could almost picture her. Blond curls cascading around her shoulders, bright topaz-colored eyes narrowed in a shrewd expression as she tried to ascertain the truth in something. She knew me.

  “Okay, to be fair, it’s not my fault the date ended early.”

  She laughed. “Uh-huh. Of course, it’s not your fault, baby.”

  “It’s not,” I insisted. “I got mugged.”

  She went deadly serious then. “Is that why you’re calling? Were there witnesses? Do I need to engage Babel Protocol?”

  Why did everyone always assume I handled things with my weapons? You accidentally stab one human trafficker, and no one ever let you forget it. “No need for Babel. He’s still standing. I had no choice. I was with a witness.”

  “That sounds more like it.”

  “One more thing. I knew the mugger. It was Stannis Prochenko.”

  That name alone made Addie put on her serious voice. “Did he follow you? Does he know where you live?”

  “Undetermined. He interrupted my date, but there were no indications he followed us home.”

  “Did your date see him? Would he be able to identify Stannis?”

  I had no time to think, but my brain did the processing for me. If at any point The Firm thought we had exposure from Marcus they might decide to deal with him. So I did the only thing I could. I lied. “No. I ran after him. I saw him as I was trying to get his mask off but when the civilian approached, I put the mask back. I didn’t want him having exposure.” Over the years I’d learned to lie expertly. But I’d never lied to Addie. It didn’t sit well to do it now.

  “Jesus Ly, that could have been bad.”

  “I know.” I rubbed my temples in an attempt to ward off the adrenaline headache. “I want an assessment on my ID and location.”

  She sighed. “Only you would somehow get mugged by a member of Victus on a date.”

  “I didn’t go looking for any trouble. Trouble found me.”

  “Jesus, Ly.”

  “You know what? You say that like this is my fault. I was standing there, minding my business and looking cute and kissing a hot guy, who by the way, is an excellent kisser, and bam, we got tackled.”

  There was another beat of silence. “Uh, I need you to rewind to that part about kissing a hottie.”

  I smirked at that. “Oh, you caught that, did you?”

  “Did you and Mr. Boring finally knock boots?”

  “No, we did not knock boots. But we did kiss, and he’s been holding back on me.” Her giddy squeal made me laugh, and I chuckled. “No getting excited.”

  “Who’s getting excited? I’m just saying it’s about time he dusted off your vag.”

  “I don’t want my vag to be dusted off, Addie. Can we focus on the mugger, please?”

  “Oh my God, fine. I’ll take a look. Now, tell me everything.”

  “We were about to really, really make that kiss worth something, and then the mugging happened. The guy grabbed my purse and I chased him down.”

  She sighed. “Lyra.”

  “What? My gun was inside the bag.”

  “What’s one gun on the street? There are millions. Sad but true. It’s untraceable.”

  “You know I can’t let that fly, Addie.”

  She sighed. “Do-gooder Lyra. I do love you for it.”

  “You are a do-gooder too, Addie.”

  “No, I’m not. I just play one on ops.”

  “Stop it. You’re very good at your job.”

  “I am, but sometimes I wish I wasn’t so good at it. But anyway, I’ve got an eye out. If anything comes up, we’ll see it.”

  “Thanks. It was my favorite gun.”

  “You and that damn gun.” She rolled her eyes.

  Roz had given it to me when I first joined The Firm. It was a small, compact Beretta. I disliked the fact that it was a girl gun, but I did like that it fit in my bag.

  I felt a pang when I thought of that purse. My mother had been a fashion designer. I’d travelled with her a lot when I was a kid for her work. That purse had been part of her collection. When I was seventeen, I’d borrowed it without permission and gotten an ink stain on the inner lining.

  My mother had been less than pleased and banned me from ever borrowing it again. But at my graduation from high school, she’d relented and let me borrow it. And when she died, she left me everything. But like the rest of my old life, I’d buried that part of me in a storage facility near where I’d grown up outside of Boston.

  The HD Accra had been the only item I’d kept with me in my new life.

  It was funny how buried memories never wanted to stay that way.

  Most of the things, I’d doled out to my aunts. I’d only kept the HD Accra clutch. The son of a bitch had taken it from me, so I wanted access to him to make him pay.

  We’re not in the revenge business.

  Yes, yes, not in the revenge business. Blah-blah-blah.

  “Hey, we all have our crutches.”

  Addie turned the topic back toward what she wanted to hear. “So back to this mind-blowing kiss. And please, please tell me you saw a dick.”

  “No, I did not. But I sure felt one though.”

  “Okay, this is getting better.”

  I laughed. “Oh Addie, no, he, um, helped clean my knee because I got hurt.”

  Addie laughed. “Did you even feel the skinned knee?”

  “No. But still, I had to pretend and play it up for him.”

  She chuckled softly. “If he only had a clue about our training.”

  “The skinned knee was hardly something to even stop for. Anyway, he cleaned up my cuts, patched me up and all that goodness, and then I tried to let him down easy.”

  She groaned. “Oh my God, no. Why?”

  “Well, you know, I just… If I have trouble, I’m not dropping it at his doorstep. That’s not fair.”

  “Right. Okay, then what?”

  “Then I tried to tell him that we were probably great as friends. He said he had zero interest in that because he had plenty of friends. And then I kissed him.”

  All I heard was a slapping noise from her end. “Hot damn. Yes, you did. Way to send mixed messages.”

  I snorted a laugh then. “You’re ridiculous. I was confused, okay?”

  “I know. But that’s why I’m so loveable. Anyway, so you kissed, and then?”

  My insides warmed just thinking about the slow slide of his tongue and the way his hands fisted ever so slightly in my hair. “It was a really, really good kiss.”

  She cackled at that. “About damn time. Now do you see what you’ve been missing out on? Hooking up with Valentine ops, while handy, is not the way to do things. It makes it so much hotter if you’re like totally into the guy.”

  My skin prickled. Addie was the only person other than Roz who knew what had happened with Tyler. I was twenty-one, and Roz had been training me for two years. I had the makings of a great agent, but I still froze on any operation that required me to cozy up to men.

  It wasn’t that I was uncomfortable;
it was more that I didn’t really know my body. I hadn’t had much opportunity to date, and before I knew it, I was an agent. So Roz had introduced me to Tyler. His job was to show me the ropes, teach me how to flirt and kiss. At no point was it supposed to turn into anything real, but nobody told me that. So I’d believed the stolen kisses, the whispered words. I’d believed that high, lightheaded, freefall feeling. After all, Tyler was very good at his job.

  For four months, he treated me like his girlfriend. When neither one of us was out on a mission, we were together. Tooled around town like a couple. Shopping and movie nights and bowling. And then one day, he dropped me. Wouldn’t take my calls, didn’t even say hello to me in the halls. He was cold and perfunctory. I didn’t handle it well. Matter of fact, I demanded that he tell me what the hell was going on. And ever so helpful as he was, he told me everything.

  It had never been real. The Firm had determined that I needed to lose my virginity to be more effective in the field. And he was just the agent that had landed the job.

  I’d been a job.

  Roz had thought that she was doing me some great favor by finding me someone nice, cute, gentle, and kind. Little did she know that his directive was to break me in and then turn me into an effective agent.

  I’d never forgiven myself for believing. Then I never got over it. I’d known that in our line of work, lying was par for the course. I’d known better than to trust anyone with a smile and some kind words. But Tyler… He really, truly cemented that distrust. And something icy and cold had wrapped around my heart.

  And now I realized that for all his expertise, that floaty feeling of first discovery, I’d still never felt with him the way that I had when Marcus kissed me. Like I was being struck by little tiny lightning bolts all over my body. Like all I wanted to do was rub my body all against him. Like I was willing to beg for whatever he might give me.

  Not that I was going to beg, because I refused to ever be that pathetic again. It was for the best that Marcus Black and I stayed away from each other.

  After everything was over, I finally confessed everything about Tyler to Addie in a drunken night of feeling sorry for myself. I was relieved when Tyler was reassigned to the London office. It wasn’t even so much that I still carried a torch for him. It was just that watching my humiliation walk up and down the hallways every day was pure torture.