Page 38 of Quiet Protector
“Shut up, Grayson. All agents know undercover gangbangs are excluded from successful Honey Pot ruse tallies.”
When Grayson laughs, my lips quirk in surprise. I’m not stunned by his lack of denial. I told you he’s dabbled in many situations while undercover. It’s the fact Phillipa is aware of his shady past. Is she keeping tabs on him as she does me, or have they talked more often than they’ve let on?
Realizing now isn’t the time for an in-depth investigation into fellow agents’ personal lives, I mutter, “I’ll give it a shot when she returns from the harbor. Until then…” Even Grayson groans when I nudge my head to the stack of paperwork Harvey had couriered from Parkerville. He knows firsthand there’s no such thing as a day off when you work for the divisions we do.
* * *
After slapping hands with Agent Moses, who’s slotted into his new position of a doorman rather quickly, I ride the elevator to Regan’s penthouse apartment. Isaac’s security team removed the camera from the hallway of this apartment building not long after Regan moved back to Texas.
As I mosey down the corridor that’s wider than most living rooms, I dip my chin in greeting to the undercover operative dusting a chandelier lamp partway down. Although our team is small, we set up an unprecedented around-the-clock watch for both Melody and Isabelle. Whether retired or current, agents came out of the woodwork when I commenced cashing in the favors I amassed as part of Tobias’s crew. It was rare for Tobias’s favors to be reciprocated, so his team was owed many at the time of his death.
“Calm those nerves, punk. You’re not picking up your girl for the prom.”
I hear Grayson’s cheeks incline when I garble out, “Easy for you to say. You’re not the one attempting to pick up a taken woman.”
“True.” His infamous chin-scrub any time his thoughts wander crackles down the wireless earpiece in my ear. “I much prefer the married ones.”
While shaking my head, I tap on the microphone in my shirt to indicate for surveillance to commence before racking my knuckles on Regan’s penthouse entrance door. When my knock is followed by a short stretch of silence, I whisper, “I thought you said no movements were recorded this morning?”
“They weren’t. I’m looking at the sheets right now. People have come and gone, but neither Isabelle nor Regan were seen leaving. Call out. Maybe she’s laying low?” My jaw tightens when Grayson adds, “Not surprising considering she’s sleeping with the enemy.”
“She’s still an agent.”
“Acompromisedagent,” Grayson fires back, his tone unusually stern. “She’ll get no sympathy from me.”
After calling him a grumpy bastard under my breath, I give his suggestion a try. “Izzy, it’s Brandon. Are you home?”
Although no voices project through the thick wooden door, I hear the scuffling of feet, then, a few seconds later, the door is pulled open.
“Damn…my brother had good taste.”
Regan is gorgeous, but I can’t look at her in the same light Alex and Grayson do. For one, Alex may kill me, and two, Regan is too fierce looking for me. She portrays a woman who’d rather whip me than snuggle with me. Melody and I experimented sexually our first year of college, but bondage never entered the equation.
I peer at Isabelle over Regan’s shoulder when Regan removes my coat without speaking a word. Isabelle is giggling like she heard my inner monologue, but her chuckles are barely heard over Grayson’s numerous lewd comments. I’m glad his last few months undercover didn’t affect his ability to rile me, but I wish he’d pick a better time and location.
I can feel my cheeks heating, and it has nothing to do with Regan’s thorough pat-down. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear she was the agent in the hall. I feel seconds from being told to bend over and unclench my butt cheeks so she can finalize her search ofallthe cavities in my body.
“Admit it, you’re hard,” Grayson mutters down the line, still laughing. “I am.”
Fighting to hold back a gag, I dip my chin in thanks to Regan when she hangs my jacket in the entry closet. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. I’m glad it was as good for you as it was me…” When Grayson’s words are stolen by a groan, I make a mental note to thank Phillipa for keeping him in line.
Just as Regan tells me, “It was my pleasure,” Isabelle joins us in the foyer. The past twenty-four hours have been good for her. She looks like she got some sleep, and her eyes are glistening from I don’t want to know what.
When she curls her arms around my shoulders to greet me with a hug, I whisper in her ear, “She scares me.”
“Good one, punk. Bring out the frightened-boy act. It works on anyone with a vagina.”
The annoyed expression on my face from Grayson’s grading of my act can be excused for shock when Regan mutters, “I heard that.” She saunters into a living area three times the size of mine before spinning back around to face Isabelle and me. “And you should be scared.”
She snags a stack of paperwork off the coffee table before entering a hallway on our right, her brisk strides only slowing to do one final glance of my body.
My chin automatically lifts when Grayson’s gravelly tone is switched for Phillipa’s songful one. “She’s onto you.”
Although curious to discover what gave away my ruse, I don’t have time to unravel the woman who has Alex twisted up in knots. The gala is two nights away. We’re down to the wire.
Once I’m confident my expression is neutral, I shift on my feet to face Isabelle. “I hope you don’t mind me popping in like this, Izzy, but I couldn’t call you on your cell since Hunter smashed it, and I don’t have any of Regan’s contact details.”
