“Are you telling me this actually takes photos?” The pendant was relatively tiny.
He demonstrated how it flipped open, where the button to take photos was, and how to use the device, and then closed it again. “It takes very good photos as long as you do exactly what I told you to do.”
“How is that possible?” I questioned.
“I’d tell you, but then I’d have to kill you,” he said in a mocking tone.
I shot him a tremulous smile. “Highly classified?” I asked.
“Actually, yes. And so is this.” He pulled something else out of his pocket.
“What?”
He slid a simple beaded bracelet over my wrist. It was plain, and like the pendant, it was nothing flashy. I was guessing it was supposed to be nondescript so as to not draw attention.
He adjusted the beads carefully as he said, “Touch the beads, but don’t twist them.”
I put my index finger carefully on the cool, artificial stones. “One of them is smooth,” I mused.
Marcus quickly explained how the pepper spray device worked. It was pretty simple. With a quick, powerful twist to the smooth stone, a high concentrate of pepper spray released into an assailant’s eyes if one’s aim was good.
“Aim well, and make sure you have an escape route,” he advised. “If you don’t move your ass, you’ll end up getting some of it yourself. Don’t do it in an enclosed area or if you can’t get away.”
I marveled at some of the nifty gadgets that Marcus had access to. “Got it,” I acknowledged. “What? No matching ring?”
“No, but I have earrings,” he mentioned casually, drawing a pair of plain black stones out of his other pocket.
I was wearing a pair of dangle earrings that matched my white shirt, but he motioned for me to take them off, and I ridded myself of them quickly.
“Do I want to know what these do?” I asked as I threaded both wires through my pierced holes.
“Press the inside button on either one of them and the signal comes directly to me,” he explained. “And you’d better use it at the first sign of trouble,” he grumbled.
“Panic buttons?” I asked.
“Don’t wait until you panic,” he advised. “Once you think he might be onto you, push the damn button. I’m going to be on your ass anyway, but I need you to signal me if there’s a problem.”
Nice as all these tiny tools might be, what really touched me was the fact that Marcus Colter looked worried.
“Hey,” I said softly. “I’ll be okay.”
His staunch expression didn’t soften as he snaked a hand around the back of my neck. “You better be. Don’t take any chances, Danica. Promise me.”
I glanced up at him, meeting his tumultuous gray eyes. My heart skittered as I saw the strain on his face. “I won’t. I promise.”
“I must be fucking crazy for helping you do this,” he rasped.
“I’m crazy,” I corrected. “You’re just watching out for me.”
“That seems to be a job I do well,” he said hoarsely as his head lowered to capture my mouth.
I couldn’t help but sink into his hard body, opening for him as he demanded my submission. I wrapped my arms around his neck, losing myself in his strength for a moment, allowing myself to feel.
I’d steel myself for my meeting with Becker as soon as Marcus let me go, but for just an instant, I needed to feel protected, and the only one who could make me feel less alone was the man who was holding me like he never wanted to let me go.
Marcus
It had been the worst kind of torture to watch Dani get in her car and drive away.
Yeah, I was following behind her in a very ordinary sedan, but I knew I had to keep my distance, and I hated it.
I should have pulled her out of this whole thing. What in the hell was I thinking?
I’d questioned my own sanity several times over the last few days. Usually, I’d use whatever contacts I could get with a threat to national security, and Becker was definitely dangerous because of his enormous funding of the rebels.
But she was no ordinary contact.
And the way I felt leaving her at all vulnerable was downright insane.
I didn’t want her with Becker. I didn’t even want her in the same city with him. Yet, I needed her to help me gain access to critical information, intel that would finally bring Becker down for good.
Jett had made incredible progress by “digging” for dirt on Becker on the dark web, but not quite enough to present to the necessary departments to take him down. Hell, Becker had so many offenses it was going to be hard to figure out who was going to handle what on government offenses. But that wasn’t my concern.
I wanted to bust Becker on so many levels, but the sense of protecting our country from foreign governments or terrorists was ingrained in me. What I wanted the most was to take Becker down for good. After that, I wanted the whole damn organization that had harmed Dani to cease to exist and not be a threat to our goddamn planet.
Everything I was insisted that I let Dani get access to intel. I’d been using any method necessary to impede anybody who wanted to harm the US in any way. However, as a man, I was having one hell of a time watching Danica be some kind of sacrifice.
“I’ll get her out quickly,” I muttered, still trying to convince myself that I was doing the right thing.
In theory, one person for a nation was a fair trade-off.
But that wasn’t at all how I felt right now.
If Becker caught Dani in action, or doubted her loyalty to him, he’d kill her without a second thought.
“Fuck!” I exploded, slamming my hand on the steering wheel. My only consolation was that I had various departments of the government to back me up, even though I technically didn’t exist for the CIA.
I wasn’t an employee.
Nobody had a file on me.
The information I gained was put in investigative files, and my involvement quickly disappeared.
Just the way I liked it.
However, I’d helped enough starched shirts in the government that I could still call on plenty of people for help, including the FBI and some of my fellow CIA agents.
I watched as Dani pulled into a driveway ahead of me, and I stayed back, parking some distance away and cutting my headlights.
Now wasn’t the time to second-guess myself. I needed to keep my head on straight and think like a spy.
She had every available gadget I could get my hands on to both protect her and help her stay undetected. Yeah, I broke out in a sweat as I watched her exit her compact vehicle in a skirt so short that she had to yank it down to cover the cheeks of her ass. It wasn’t that I didn’t appreciate the look. But I didn’t want any other guy looking at Dani the same way.
As usual, she’d done her makeup way too heavy, but she was just as damn gorgeous as ever, and I coveted her, wanting to keep her all to myself.
As she disappeared into the luxury home, I had to admit to myself that she was the gutsiest female I’d ever encountered. She’d never flinched in trying to bring the world international news, and she hadn’t broken under the captivity of men who had tormented her in every way possible.