Page 32 of Wicked and Claimed

It would crush her.

Why hadn’t she seen heartbreak coming when she’d started hardcore flirting back with him all those months ago? Why hadn’t she foreseen how totally falling for him would break her heart?

CHAPTER SEVEN

On Sunday afternoon, Nash stretched out on his battered leather couch, nursing a cold beer as the Packers-Vikings game flickered across his TV screen. Despite the fact nearly forty-eight hours had passed since New Year’s Eve, his thoughts kept drifting back to the scorching kiss he’d laid on Haisley. Even mass amounts of tequila couldn’t dim the memory of her soft curves molded against his body, those sinful lips under his as he devoured her for the first time in two agonizing years.

His blood ran hot, despite the lingering chill of the winter morning. Then again, the gorgeous redhead had always set him on fire. From the moment he’d met her, Haisley’s saucy aloofness had ignited him. During their year together, his instant and burning need to give her pleasure had become a never-ending urge to make her his.

The shrill ring of his cellphone shattered his reverie. Nash frowned at the familiar number flashing across the display and braced himself. “Hey, boss. Happy New Year.”

“Yep. Same to you.” Hunter Edgington was a former SEAL, and, as usual, the man’s gruff tone signaled that he had no patience for pleasantries. “We’ve got a new job, and you’re up.”

So much for a lazy afternoon indulging in fantasies about Haisley naked in his bed as his lips blazed kisses across her skin, down to focus on her sweet, dripping pussy. Nash sat up straighter. “What’s the op?”

“Heard anything about young women going missing from that new mall?”

Holy shit. Someone had hired EM Security to look into this case? And Hunter was assigning him? After Nash had agreed to study it with Haisley? Talk about ironic…

If his hunch was right, Nash understood why Hunter had prefaced his new assignment with that question. The disappearances had barely made a blip in the local press. In the last couple of days, he’d looked. All he’d found were a few vague bulletins quickly buried in the local news cycle.

“Not nearly as much as I should be. I’m smelling a cover-up.” Like someone rich and powerful was working overtime to keep a tight lid on the whole sordid mess.

Hunter grunted in grim agreement. “That’s my read, too. After the most recent disappearance, the mall’s developer, George Benedict, hired EM Security to get to the bottom of the incidents. I think we’re his out with the press and law enforcement so he can claim he’s doing ‘everything possible’ to stop the abductions.”

Nash frowned. He didn’t know much about the wealthy local real estate mogul, just whispers—mostly that Benedict was a blowhard whose sole concerns were making money and preserving his interests. Dealing with him and his BS wasn’t something Nash was looking forward to, but business was business.

“Know if he’s done anything to stop the abductions prior to hiring us?”

“From what I can gather, the minimum for optics. He upgraded the tech some and hired a few new guards. That kind of shit. Nothing actually likely to stop the kidnappings.”

Hunter was rarely wrong, and Nash agreed with his boss’s assessment. “Think Benedict has anything to do with these disappearances?”

“Anything is possible.”

“We doing recon on him, too, or just running a straightforward op?” Nash scrubbed a hand over his stubbled jaw.

“For now, we play nice and keep this aboveboard,” Hunter insisted. “EM Security will handle the investigation into those missing women, end of story. But if the trail leads you to Benedict, we’ll start sorting his dirty laundry. Quietly, mind you. He can’t know.”

Nash huffed, resigning himself to navigating the situation with kid gloves—at least for the time being. Looking for angles and ulterior motives was second nature to him, but he couldn’t deny the urgency of this case. Five young women had gone missing under very suspicious circumstances from the same spot in the last handful of months—and since powerful players were doing their damnedest to keep that buried, Nash suspected the case would be rough.

Under his online alias, he’d have to be careful about feeding Haisley and her inquisitive spirit too many details. The last thing Nash wanted was to put her in harm’s way, especially if this case turned as insidious as his gut warned. She was clever—sometimes too much. She loved to snoop and dig, so he’d have to keep her part of the investigation chewing on theories and information while she stayed safely at home. Unfortunately, he couldn’t shake the worry that she might push to get deeper. Or worse, start her own investigation.

“Understood,” he said at length. “What are my marching orders?”

“Report to Benedict’s office at ten hundred tomorrow for briefing and standby. I’m slotting Ethan to partner with you. He needs the experience of dealing with difficult clients and not just saying fuck you to authority all the time. I’m counting on you to make sure he doesn’t trip over his own dick out there.”

A reluctant grin tugged at Nash’s mouth. No surprise that Hunter wanted him to babysit Ethan. His housemate had slowly become a friend, but Nash knew the kid’s weaknesses. One of them was his short temper, especially when he perceived injustice…or when someone in a position of power tried to tell him what to do. He could balance Ethan. And together, they’d proven that, despite bending the rules occasionally, they got results.

“Roger that.”

“I need you to listen.” Hunter’s insistent bark pulled Nash from his musings. “This must be an airtight op. We’ll be dealing with the press and some powerful people in this town. No deviating from protocol or pulling that shady, back-alley shit you two loose screws seem to favor.”

Nash held back a mirthless chuckle. So much for operational flexibility. “I read you loud and clear, boss. We’ll be model fucking Boy Scouts.”

“Sure you will.” The muffled sound of feminine sarcasm filtered through. No doubt that was Hunter’s wife, Kata.

“I’m serious,” Hunter insisted. “Handle this clean and by the book, or there will be hell to pay.”

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