“Jail is jail, and this is a woman who’s never faced a moment in her life when she wasn’t the smartest, most accomplished person in any given room.” Levi seemed much more comfortable now that he wasn’t talking about some woman named Solo and they’d moved on to his evil plans.
“I agree,” Paul added, feeling confident in this as well. His original plan to rid himself of Rebecca Walsh meshed beautifully with what the CIA agent needed. Once it had been explained to him, he’d understood how they could help each other. “She’ll do anything to stay out of jail. She’s been very sheltered.”
Mo Chou shrugged. “Well, I don’t care. What I care about is what you need from me, Levi, and what I get out of it if I can’t take the cancer research back to my bosses. I don’t see why I should help you.”
“I didn’t say you wouldn’t get anything out of it,” Levi said simply, as though he knew he held all the cards in this particular game. “What would you say if I offered you Ezra Fain on a silver platter?”
“I would say I would rather have the research,” she replied. “I could pick up a burned CIA operative in a heartbeat. Besides, he’s working with Taggart, and that man gives me a headache. You get him involved, you get his wife involved, and those other sarcastic bastards. Now, if you would like to kidnap Kayla Summers, I’ll kill her myself. That’s one I’d risk Tag’s wrath for.”
“Kay’s too much in the public eye now,” Levi replied.
Mo Chou’s eyes narrowed. “I want a copy of the research McDonald left behind and I want one of those boys. Shaw will work. Taggart will believe he could turn on the team. After all, wasn’t he the one who turned in Tag’s brother and sister-in-law? We can set him up while we’re setting up Walsh. I know our doctors would love to get a look at his brain, to see how the drug affected him.”
A chill went up Paul’s spine. They were talking about people. They were bargaining with real human lives.
They were powerful.
Levi held a hand out. “Done. I never could stand Shaw anyway. And if you get a chance to shoot Ezra when things inevitably go bad, do a guy a solid.”
“I don’t know,” she said, shaking his hand and thereby sealing the deal. “I kind of like having the two of you at each other’s throats. Or rather at Solo’s…”
Levi sat back, his eyes going cold. “Leave her out of this. And I expect you to follow my instructions to the letter. I need you to meet with Walsh next week. I’ve set everything up.”
They were acting like he wasn’t even here. He’d been the one to set the plan in motion. Without him, they would have nothing to back up the narrative they intended to build. “I want something, too.”
A single brow rose over Levi’s light eyes. “I rather thought getting rid of Walsh was your prize.”
Yes, but they’d made him think so much bigger. “I want to get rid of my father. Permanently.”
“I’ll kill him on my way out,” Mo Chou agreed with a wave of her hand. “I don’t mind. Really, I hate the bastard and he’s a terribly selfish lover. And if he called me exotic one more time I was going to kill him anyway.”
“Then it’s a deal,” Levi said before leaning forward and explaining the plan.
Paul sat back, a calm coming over him he hadn’t expected. Control. He was taking control for the first time in his life.
He would have what he wanted, and then the world would see who the truly strong Huisman was.
He sat back, thoughts of revenge playing through his head.
Owen stared down at her, her head in his lap as he sat back against a tree in Clarence Square Park. They’d found a bit of shade, but there was a chill in the air so she was wearing his leather jacket.
“You’re sure you don’t want to find something better than hot dogs.” He’d taken her from a gorgeous, upscale café and they’d driven all around Toronto. They’d stopped in Yonge-Dundas Square and eaten from a street vendor, sitting underneath the red umbrellas, the city rising around them.
“I liked it,” she said with a sigh. “And I like it here. It’s pretty.”
What she seemed to like most were the dogs. There were plenty of them here. She’d stopped and petted a couple, talking to the owners in an open, friendly way.
He put a hand on her head and smoothed her hair back. He loved this intimacy with her. Anyone who walked by would see nothing at all out of the ordinary. They would see a couple spending a lazy Sunday together, enjoying the lovely weather.
Why couldn’t they be exactly that? What would the world be like if he hadn’t made that single mistake? If he’d been able to meet her as the old Owen Shaw? Would he have fallen for her quirky beauty and brought her home to meet his mum and sister?
Or would he have been the bastard who couldn’t see through her cardigans and glasses and intellect to the raw woman beneath, the one who seemed to somehow complete him, bring him some semblance of peace?
“I like it here, too.” But he had to remind himself over and over again that he had nothing to offer her. He would be in her life for a few weeks and then if everything went perfectly, he would disappear. He could leave her with an explanation, that his job was going to take him back to the States or even Europe, and sure they might talk sometime, but he wouldn’t see her again.
He’d enjoyed the afternoon with her far too much for his peace of mind. There had been a few moments when he’d worried she was going to sit back down at that table with her date, but otherwise the day had been perfect.
Except that he knew what was happening back at her place. Ezra and Robert were going through her apartment. They were invading her privacy, stealing her secrets, and he was the one making it happen.
Guilt gnawed at him when her eyes opened and she looked up at him, completely trusting. “I thought we were playing it cool, Shaw.”
That brought about a genuine smile. “Never believe a man who wants to get under your skirt, love. He’ll tell you anything you want to hear. I never wanted to play it cool. I see something I want and I do what I need to make it mine.”
“That is very caveman like of you,” she said with a smile.
“I never said I was much of a modern man.” But he was. Or at least he had been. According to what he’d learned about himself, he’d been perfectly happy to fuck and send whoever he was fucking along their happy way so he could fuck someone else. He’d broken more than one heart, that man he’d been.
“I don’t want to see anyone else, Owen,” she said quietly. “I thought I should, but I couldn’t stand that man, and it was about more than the fact that he talked about his dog so much. It was because it felt wrong to be on a date with him when I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”
Well, in this case he didn’t have to lie. “I spent every moment between the time I left and the minute you hopped on my bike thinking of ways to see you again. Robert gave me the most terrible time for it.”
It had really been Erin, but Robert had gotten his punches in, too. Sarcastic bastard. Maybe he should have gone easier on him about the whole Ariel situation.
“So we’re going to try this thing?” She asked the question so seriously it would likely have made the old Owen flee in terror.
All the new Owen could think of was how much he wanted to really try with her. “Yeah, I think we are. I’m not interested in other women. You’re all I can handle.”
“And I’m never letting anyone set me up again. Ever. I’m only dating men I meet in the elevator,” she said, a sparkle in her eyes.
Brat. He let his hand shift under the leather jacket, giving her nipple a nice twist that had her squirming.
“Owen!”
“No one was looking until you yelled, love,” he replied, knowing damn well there was a smirk on his lips.
Her face was flushed as she sat up and wrinkled her nose his way. “We’re in public.”
“Then don’t be a brat.” He reached over and pulled her onto his lap. It made it much easier to nuzzle her neck. And to whisper into her ear. “Don’t think I won’t take what’s mine wherever I want to. The minute you got on the back of my bike, you became mine.”