“Hey, brother,” Bobby called.“Where’dyourattention go?”
“Sorry, sorry.”He dropped the bag on his desk chair.“Let me switch you to video.”He swapped the audio call for visual and propped the device against the stack of unopened mail on his desk.“Just got a lot going on here.”
“You got a woman you’re not telling us about?”
A man, maybe, but until thatmaybebecame a firmeryes, he wasn’t going to spring his bisexuality on his family.He’d never been serious enough with anyone to bring them home, and he’d kept his college partying to campus.
So he’d chickened out and never corrected his family’s assumption.He felt like a coward every day for it, especially after Jamie had been brave enough to come out last year and with the rest of his friends here who were out and proud.Another way he didn’t measure up.Granted, his family had taken Jamie’s coming out in stride, sending wedding gifts and well wishes, but Cam didn’t know how they would take his.Having caused his family more than enough strife already, he didn’t want to create more unless and until he had someone special in his life.And it was too soon to tell with Nic.
“Work thing,” he answered Bobby.“New assignment tomorrow.”
“Where’s this one?”
“Local.”He bent at the waist, opening the lower desk drawer and unlocking his safe there.
“That why you called?”
Maybe he shouldn’t have.He’d just worry Bobby, and if Bobby told anyone else in the family, they would worry too.But Bobby knew better than anyone the Cam he was about to become again.He was the only one Cam could talk to about how much that fucking scared him.
“Remind me...”From inside the safe, Cam withdrew the bag of tools long since retired.“Best way to jack an AmSec 8000 series vault door?”
Bobby’s blue eyes widened, then the dark brow above them furrowed, forming a deep crease between them.“Why do you need to know that?”
“The assignment I mentioned...undercover gig.”
“Not someone else who can do that?”
“’Fraid not.”He had the skills, and there were people he had to rescue.Others he needed to protect.This was his job.
“You really need me to remind you?”Bobby said.
Of course he didn’t.Despite the intervening years, Cam had done it so many times it would be like riding a bike.If he’d really needed pointers, he would have asked Danny instead of worrying his brother.
He tossed the tools into his bag, tossed the bag onto the treadmill, then sank into the desk chair.“Called for a different reminder.”He pulled out his wallet and the library card again, smoothing a thumb over the name preserved in laminate.More than could be said for the owner’s body, which two decades later was still missing.When he glanced back up, Bobby’s eyes were likewise on the card, as sad and heavy as Cam’s chest felt.“We made a deal,” Cam said.
Bobby blinked, casting aside the same memories plaguing Cam.“This is for work.”
“Still, we said never?—”
“You got backup?”
“Yeah, my partner.”The memory of Nic rolling over the car hood streaked behind his eyes again.If he would go to those lengths for their CIs...“And the prosecutor on the case.He’s retired Special Forces.”
“Tell them about our deal,” Bobby said.
Cam hung his head as his heart raced, turning the card over in his hands.
Aidan had to know.It would have been in his file, in his psych evals.He hadn’t hidden the truth of why he’d joined the Bureau.
No, that wasn’t the reason why his pulse sped.It hammered at the prospect of exposing his grimy past to the man who always had his shit together.
“Tell them where your line in the sand is,” Bobby continued.“Make sure they hold you to it.”
But could they if he was on his own—embedded, undercover, and cut off?
He righted his head, meeting his brother’s concerned gaze.“If anything should happen?—”
“Don’t talk like that.”
