Secret Alpha Page 2

  “How’d it go?” he asked, settling his upper body back into the softness of the cushions and studying his file nonchalantly.

  Good try, Wade.

  “Well, I’m free of bullet holes for the moment, so I’m calling it a win. Not sure if he’s gonna take the bait on the merger, but only time will tell. Until then, we keep it up, business as usual, and keep a hawk-eye to our backs.”

  Wade’s wise brown eyes just studied me, the knowledge that I was downplaying my whole meeting permeating them and taking on a life of their own. I could almost feel them moving over my face, but he didn’t say a word. We both played our cards close to our chests, but in all the ways that counted, we knew where the other stood.

  With that, I eased off of the couch, tossing a file I’d been holding down into the spot I vacated.

  “I’m gonna shower and then head to work,” I told him as I turned to leave the room.

  “I’ll see you tonight?” he questioned quietly.

  “Yeah,” I affirmed. “But I might be late.” I turned back toward him and added a wink for good measure. It was a little slimy, but I was desperate to lighten the mood, for both of our sakes.

  Anxiety didn’t clarify decision making skills; it muddied them. And with the intensity of this case, neither of us needed the distraction of the fog.

  “Oh my God! Danny! Harder!”

  Harder. They always wanted it fucking harder. And faster. I guess savoring a slow romp wasn’t what was in style these days. Fifty Shades of Grey kinky fucking was the in thing.

  That, and offering to forego the use of a condom because they were on the pill. Three of the last four women I had been with had suggested going bare, and fuck if that wasn’t disappointing. Did none of these women take responsibility for protecting themselves against STDs these days?

  I had the urge to give them a speech, but I refrained. I wasn’t their camp counselor. I was their one night stand.

  I never did repeats. That sounds horrible, and I guess, in a way, it is. But for me, it wasn’t about the excitement going stale. If I’m honest, the excitement was a few days old from the beginning. I made sure we both got our pleasure, but after that it was done. A revolving door of women was the only way to go when there’s a potential price on your head. No one is special to you. Therefore, no one is special enough to use against you. Not to mention, a reputation as a playboy only boosted the legitimacy of my alter ego as an international crime boss.

  So instead of launching a soap box fueled campaign, I donned a condom from my own supply, protecting us both. I couldn’t protect all these faceless women during their other dalliances, but with me, I would protect them the best I could.

  I thrusted my hips harder, as requested, and swiped my thumb roughly across the pebble of her dusky red nipple. She moaned overzealously, and I had to fight the urge to roll my eyes.

  Porn noises. Another trend.

  Luckily, her body was hot and my dick was liking it just fine, despite the clash in our personalities.

  “Oh, Danny...yes! Ah! Oh God! Oh, yes! Baby! It’s so good,” she spouted out as she clenched around me, like a thesaurus trying to come up with all the different ways to say she was enjoying it.

  I was enjoying it too, at least physically, a low grunt ruminating out of my throat as my climax tickled its way up my spine. Mentally and emotionally, I had never felt more empty.

  For the time being, I would keep up the routine of casual sex, but I knew it wouldn’t be long before I was seriously questioning if I was actually getting more good out of it than bad. In fact, I was already questioning it.

  Despite the carnal gratification, my feelings of loneliness and lack of focus settled deeper into my gut with each romp.

  I was already on my way off of the bed, the condom was disposed of, I was settling my jeans around my hips, and slipping the button through the hole when she gushed, “Danny, baby, that was so good.”

  Before she could ask for a repeat or start into any sort of conversation, I gave her the gratification of saying, “It was good for me too. Thanks,” before hauling ass out the door, my jeans still ruffled up over my boots with my haste.

  She may have been upset, or maybe she wasn’t. The truth is, I wouldn’t know.

  Because I never looked back.

  Two days later...

  “It’s not so bad.”

  Swinging my head toward Wade slowly, I made sure my eyes held just the right amount of incredulity.

  A boat load.

  “How is this ‘not so bad’?” I asked while thumbing unhurriedly through the newest round of surveillance photos and contemplating the ridiculous direction my superiors wanted to take this case.

  “She’s not that bad looking,” Wade insisted before continuing, “Plus, I’m starting to worry your going to be a crazy cat lady. Or dude, as the case may be.”

  Ignoring my scathing look of contempt with ease, he elaborated, “You know, the one that’s on the episode of Hoarding: Buried Alive where some of her cats are, quote, missing, but they’re really a squashed skeleton at the bottom of one of her piles of clothes. She doesn’t know because she can’t make it anywhere in her house quickly enough to look for them all, and she’s all alone. No friends, no lovers, no anything.”

  “One, I have no cats, and two, I don’t hoard anything. Our house is minimalistic at best,” I countered, still flipping through the photos as I spoke. “And three, you need to stop fucking watching shows about hoarding.”

  “There may be no cats or insane amount of stuff, but you are a lonely asshole.”

  Wade knew I kept the company of women, but he knew the kind of company I kept.

  He was right. I was lonely. And most definitely an asshole.

  Ignoring those endearingly sweet, but unfortunately true, words from the only “family” I had, I kept focused on the task at hand. Wade mumbled almost incoherently to himself in the background as I did. “What’s so wrong with Hoarding: Buried Alive? It’s a learning show. It’s on The Learning Channel.”

  Christ Almighty.

  As I looked down at the photo of the FBI’s vote for my new girlfriend, turned away from the camera with her head down, I could barely believe what the zoom lens had captured.

  “For fucks sake, Wade. I am not sleeping with this woman,” I declared as I shoved the photo straight into his chest with a little more force than necessary. Before he had a chance to see the abomination for himself, I enlightened him. “She has a fucking tattoo on her neck that says ‘Daddy’s Girl’. That’s not normal! Be it pervy father or kinky lover, I personally have no desire to read the word ‘Daddy’ anywhere on her body while I’m taking her from behind. Not happening. And I know it’s not a memorial tattoo because her father is still fucking alive.”

  “Just keep an open mind, Danny. Maybe you don’t have to have sex with her, but closing off the possibility of getting close to her may just fuck us completely.”

  God, he was annoying. I hated nothing more than when Wade was right, and his “right” was unequivocally my “wrong”.

  “Fine. I’ll keep an open mind. But I am not putting my dick in her box,” I swore vehemently.

  “What?” Wade questioned, completely dumbfounded by my Justin Timberlake reference.

  “Don’t worry about it,” I said brushing it off rather than spending the next five minutes of my life explaining useless information. Besides, Wade was right on target. Outside of my job, I was living the life of a spinster, so saying things to him that he didn’t have a prayer of understanding had become one of my only forms of entertainment.

  Ah, cheap thrills.

  I left Wade to lock the surveillance photos in the safe and strolled out of our office toward the living room. My motorcycle was calling me, the rides I took with it between my legs some of the best thinking sessions I had ever had, but I knew I wasn’t supposed to be drawing attention to myself by openly engaging in my real habits.

  My work alter ego, Dan Smith, International Arms Dealer,
wouldn’t make a habit of opening himself up to ambush so easily. Especially since he had pretty much invited a known killer to try to kill him.

  Obviously, my alter ego was a cocky bastard.

  But I was tired. We needed to make moves, finagle our way in, take Villanuevo down, and then, finally, be able to move on.

  We had been undercover for almost two years now, and physical and mental fatigue were starting to wear on me. I knew the importance of what we were doing, how much crime we were preventing by not only making moves to take down a top arms trafficker like Sergio Villanuevo, but also using our own cover operation to filter hundreds of guns out of the mainstream black market.

  However, sometimes, goodwill and positive intent can’t overcome the body’s visceral reaction—human nature’s directive of wanting to have a life of your own. Someone to share with and, furthermore, to be able to do it with complete honesty. I was on a precipice of deciding that while I wanted all the wrongs of the world to be converted to rights, I might not want to actually be the person to do it.

  Maybe that’s not very heroic. Maybe it’s selfish and the complete antithesis of world changing. But international crime and the players involved in it had been taking from me from a very young age—my family, my identity, my life’s path, and in large part, my happiness.

  I wasn’t going to make any rash decisions, and I certainly wouldn’t leave our current operation, or Wade, in a lurch, but I was starting to think on how I could transition when it was over.

  I knew Wade was behind me by the squeak of the floorboard, and the lack of time between leaving him in the office and sensing him behind me suggested he took just enough time to put the photos back in the safe and then came after me.

  He clearly wasn’t done talking.

  “I still have more to say.”

  Bingo.

  Turning to face him out of respect, because honestly, I owed the guy more than I gave him credit for, I met his eyes and opened my ears, ready to listen.

  “I know insinuating yourself with Isla isn’t your favorite idea,” he said cautiously, accepting my eye roll and basking in the depth of his understatement. “But we haven’t heard anything from Sergio in two days. Two days since you offered yourself up and made a huge move in trying to infiltrate his operation. Getting close with Isla is just another way to put yourself in his vicinity. It also might protect you if she ends up developing a soft spot for you.”

  Or it might be another reason to kill me.

  I didn’t tell him that.

  Instead, I took a deep breath and rubbed my forehead with a squeeze of my thumb and forefinger before answering. “I hear you,” I told him earnestly, meeting his eyes to make sure he didn’t doubt my sincerity. “And I’ll consider it. But I honestly don’t think it’s time to move on Sergio’s sister yet. Grasping at familial straws looks desperate, and desperate is the opposite of what we want to be. I think he just wants me to sweat it, which if I have any arms dealing balls at all, I won’t, and in due time, he’s going to make contact. If he didn’t want to deal, he would have just killed me.”

  His faced blanched infinitesimally, his reactions schooled and measured from years in the field, but I knew he hated when I talked about my life so cavalierly. Frankly, I wasn’t so hot on it either, but he needed to get the picture.

  In an attempt to bring things back down an emotional notch or two and tread into fairly safer waters, I told him about the news I had just gotten word on.

  “I put out a bid this morning looking for some anomalies. We have a regular shipment of AK’s with accessories coming in, but I also think I got a bead on those sixteen Stinger Missiles that when missing in Afghanistan last year.”

  “Really?” he asked, impressed. No one had heard one word about that missing hardware since it disappeared.

  “Yeah, I just got a vibe off of Olin when I was making our order. He seemed like he might have some unusual items. When I asked him if he had any toys from the sandbox his excitement went through the roof.”

  “Could be anything from over there. It might not be those stinger missiles, so don’t get your hopes up.”

  Typical Wade, never trusting in fantasy or hope, always favoring practicality and a wait and see approach.

  I had to admit that his life hadn’t been puppy dogs and rainbows, but neither had mine and, for me, hope still sprang eternal. Hope that I would have everything I’d ever dreamed of one day. Hope that the world could change, acclimate, and at very least, become a less violent place.

  Which one of us was more foolhardy was anyone’s guess.

  The telltale squeak of the front door’s hinge brought my head up reflexively. Being undercover, half of your subconscious is always watching your ass, just in case you forget to do it deliberately. Plus, I think people-watching tends to be one of those activities almost all humans participate in, and I am most definitely a Homo Sapien.

  I was once again working my bartending job at The Cabin, trying to keep up with business as usual. I had a real gut feeling that Sergio was going to take the bait soon, but like I told Wade that afternoon, the best approach was to wait it out.

  Copper strands of hair glinted subtly off of two separate, female heads, both of their faces pointed at each other, a quiet conversation in full swing. They moved slowly and spoke softly, maybe hoping to keep the attention off of themselves, but I could practically feel all of the Y-chromosomes in the room standing up and taking notice.

  So cliche, but they were already an anomaly for this small town in Alabama based on looks alone, and they also had a vibe. A seemingly physical magnetism judging by the way people leaned toward them as they passed by.

  And I definitely felt the pull.

  As they got within a distance that offered a clear view, I gave them a once over, my eyes lingering over the younger one, devouring her long exposed, legs. The outfit was appropriate, not high maintenance, and I could tell she was country despite not being local.

  Her face shimmered under the lights, no doubt thanks to some kind of glitter shit in her makeup, but I couldn’t find it in me to care.

  She was beautiful. Fresh and young, with a real, natural, womanly beauty. But it was genuine, not forced. She looked like a woman, a little chubbiness in her cheeks giving her age a slight shaving, but I could tell she was just who she was. Take it or leave it.

  Fucking hell, I wanted to take it.

  I hadn’t gotten this worked up over a woman in a long time, and I had yet to talk to her. If some other guy had said something like that I would have told him it was total bullshit, but there I was, full of shit. And happy about it.

  They were both excited to be here, that much was obvious, but the older one, and she was definitely older, albeit super hot regardless of her age, had a nervous edge to her.

  I was fucking thrilled when they wasted no time plopping right down on a couple of stools at my bar and starting up a conversation, oblivious to listening ears or wandering eyes.

  Something I had never, ever done. I always watched my back. From eight years old, I was trained to observe first, act second. I envied their freedom.

  “Okay, Mom,” the younger one said, confirming my notion that there was a difference in their age. Though, I wouldn’t have guessed there was that big of a difference.

  Talk about good fucking genes.

  “Let’s go through the list one more time. We need to be on our game, so the list needs to be second nature.”

  A list? Oh boy, this should be interesting.

  “Good idea,” her mom agreed, her shoulders releasing a little bit of tension.

  I grabbed a glass and moved toward the tap, filling the beer for my regular, Steve, keeping my ears attuned in their direction.

  “Alpha male,” my newest fantasy stated confidently, never even glancing away from her mom. I think I could have been right on top of her, and she wouldn’t have noticed me.

  “Badass,” her mom added, a slight timidity in her voice.

  Ba
ck and forth they went each listing a quality that started with the next letter in the alphabet. All the while I listened, busying myself with menial tasks in order to cover my eavesdropping.

  “Cool name.”

  “Dangerous.”

  “Experienced.”

  “Funny.”

  “Gorgeous.”

  “Hard body!”

  “Intelligent.”

  I bit back my laugh as the mom whispered, “Junk,” a choice that was very obviously chosen by my girl.

  My girl? What the fuck?

  “Kissing expert.”

  “Loving.”

  “Manly with a motorcycle!”

  “Nickname giver.”

  “One woman man.”

  “Protective.”

  “Quiet until there’s something good to say,” the daughter decreed before her mother added, “That’s right, let us do the talking!”

  She found her mom amusing, biting gently into her plump lip and shaking her head, but wearing a huge smile before adding the next quality to the list. “Romantic.”

  “Sexy.”

  “Tattooed.”

  “Understands the quirkiness that is us.”

  “Virile,” my girl purred seductively, adding, “Oh, yeah. Virile for sure.”

  Holy shit.

  Immediately, I shifted my thoughts.

  Baseball. Wade. Sergio Villanuevo. International Arms deals. Paint drying. God, anything to make my blood stop flowing south.

  Of course, my traitorous ears were now fully interested and continued to listen.

  “X-rated skills and Young at heart.”

  “Zealous about us.”

  “Excellent. Good thing we remember he needs to be zealous. Wouldn’t want to forget that,” my little smartass teased her mother.

  I found myself smiling and staring at her for a few seconds before I realized and pulled my shit together.

  I had to at least pretend to work.

  “Hey, Z was a hard letter,” her mom defended.

  She nodded her agreement and said, “Yeah, I know. We wouldn’t want him to be a zebra. Or maybe have a zebra striped tattoo on his penis or something. That would be really bad.”