Page 13 of Dirty Love

My partners don’t care, which means I’m an idiot for volunteering to fly out for this interview.

There are four of us. Jason Evans and Cole Parker are ex-Navy SEALs. Tag Browning is an ex-DC cop.

I’m ex-none-of-your-fucking-business. The hacker, the black-ops insider.

Together, we’re The Horus Group, Washington’s hottest crisis management firm.

And right now, I’m waiting in a suite at the Bel Air, watching the surveillance feed I set up earlier today on my phone. Jason is pacing. We’re here to interview Tabitha Leyton, America’s favorite singer-songwriter.

Former fuck toy of Gerome Lively, if I’m not mistaken.

We’re investigating the billionaire for human trafficking. So is the FBI, but they’re not getting anywhere. It’s complicated as fuck and the further I climb into the dark underbelly of this world, the more I realize how messy it is.

In theory, we’re here to interview Tabitha so she might be a witness at a trial against Lively—a trial I’m highly doubtful will ever take place.

Practically, we’re here because I deal in information, and if I know something about this woman, there might be a time when I can use it.

And knowinganythingabout Tabitha Leyton is a minor miracle. She’s shrouded in mystery, and not just to the public.

She’s sex and secrets personified.

From the first time she pinged on my radar, she’s had this effect on me. Unsettling. Taunting.

Her official identity is too clean. I haven’t shared this with my partners, but I know Tabitha’s hiding something. Many somethings, probably. It’s a gut feeling, and I don’t like to admit that I sometimes operate on instinct like that.

The door swings open, but it’s not the woman we’re waiting for. Instead it’s her manager, Grant Derew. Formerly an agent, Derew found Tabitha at the age of fifteen in a small town in Washington State and propelled her to stardom. Now he manages her full-time.

I instantly hate the guy. And he introduced Tabitha to Lively, so he’s already a douchebag who’s led around by his dick and a perverted desire for jailbait.

“Gentleman, I understand you had an appointment with Tabitha. Unfortunately—“

I ignore his outstretched hand, because fuck if I’m going to touch him. I shove to my feet. “Wehavean appointment, and we’re going to keep it.”

I stalk past him, through the front door of the suite. I’ve got a master room key in my pocket, and I use it to open the only other door on this floor.

She’s on the other side.

My first in-person impression isn’t what I expect.

She’s both bigger and smaller than I pictured in my head. Big hair, big tits, big attitude. But the rest of her is surprisingly small, right down to the look in her eye.

She’s scared.

She doesn’t look it. Her eyes are burning at the invasion of her privacy, as they should. I’m an asshole. I work with other assholes, and we’ll stop at nothing.

I’m going to steamroll right over her and she should be afraid of me.

Then her eyes flick past me, over my shoulder, and I turn slowly.

She’s not afraid of me.

It’s him. Derew.

One asshole knows another, and I give him a hard look, flashing my badge. He doesn’t know it’s as fake as the names I’m about to give. “Agents Gough and Weston. We need the room.”

If he was smart—he’s not—he’d have done more to vet this interview than looking us up on the FBI’s public website. Hacking that shit and putting our photos there for a few days was a kindergarten exercise. I watched someone from his office click on our page, then email him the link and say we were legit.

Fucking amateurs.

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