“How long you been here?”Cam asked after another sip.
“Fifteen minutes.”If he didn’t count the Goon Squad’s attack.
“Went that well with Abby?”
“Needed to give her time to calm down, then we talked, and then I had to fill out a ream’s worth of paperwork to get her into rotating safe houses.I think she’s settled for now.”
Cam gave him a sideways glance, then a once-over he didn’t bother to hide.Nic turned the curses on himself, realizing he hadn’t bothered to straighten his hair or shirt since the altercation in the parking lot.But by the dark look spreading over Cam’s face, his brain had gone an entirely different direction.“What did it take to get her settled?”he asked.
“I don’t swing that way,” Nic replied, staring into his beer.“Also helped Eddie load some cases when I got here.”
“You’re lying.Your tight-ass shoulders are up to your ears, you’re avoiding my eyes, and you’re drumming your fingers on your glass.”
Fucking well-trained FBI agents.Nic stilled, forced his shoulders down, and tore his gaze from his phone where they’d drifted.“Don’t FBI me.”
“Don’t attorney me.”Cam nodded at the phone.“What’s going on?”
He could give him part of the truth.Maybe it would satisfy the hound.“Odd hang-up right after I got here.”
“Connected to the case?”
“Don’t know.”It was possible, though Nic suspected it was more likely a diversion by the goons so they could sneak up on him.He needed Mel to run an off-book trace to confirm it.
“Get Jamie to hack it.”The former cyber agent, who now coached college basketball, still “consulted” on the side for the FBI and Talley Enterprises.
“Think he’s probably pretty busy at the moment.”
The last thing Nic wanted to do was draw them near his father’s shit.Let them believe the sanitized version in the media, that his father was a Bay Area real estate tycoon who was winding down his business.Certainly safer than the unsanitized version Nic suspected and had further proof of tonight.That Curtis Price was a real estate failure up to his eyeballs in debt.Nic would get to the bottom of that mess with Mel without putting the rest of them in the crosshairs.
“What’d you get out of Scott and Mike?”Nic asked, diverting Cam to the promised debrief.
“Not a damn thing.Flipping them is going to hinge on Abby.”
“She’s convinced Becca will make another run at her and at the artifacts.”
Cam raised a brow.“At the museum?”
Nic nodded.
“They’re in a voice-activated vault there too, right?The prototype of the one in the Kristics’ apartment?”
Nic nodded again.
“Then Abby’s right.Becca will need her.”Cam drained the rest of his beer.“She’ll have to make her move soon.The show opens next weekend assuming Kristic doesn’t take the artifacts back home with his wife’s...”Cam’s words drifted off, as did his gaze.Twisting on the stool, his back to Nic, he slid off and cleared his throat.“You in tomorrow?”
“After I get some paperwork done here.”Or rather, after he met Mel.
“We’ll go over security plans for the arraignment then.I want everyone safe.”Cam slapped the bar with the flat of his hand, a parting gesture.
Wanting to offer some comfort, Nic shot out a hand, covering Cam’s on the bar.“Kristic’s lucky to be alive.He has you to thank for that.”
“They both should be alive.”Cam brushed his thumb along the side of Nic’s, and Nic barely hid his shiver.
Barely stopped himself from closing the distance between them.
But he had to get his father’s shit sorted before he started anything with Cam.Probably not a smart play either, definitely more than he deserved, but he wanted that second kiss, badly.
Afterhe cleared the other hazards from the road.
