“Most of Becky’s bikes sell for six figures,” Britt was quick to explain. “And some of the truly custom jobs go for a cool half mil. Then there’s all the money in equipment and tools. So…yeah. We have a lot of security.”
“And Becky is?” Agent O’Toole’s warm, husky voice traveled up his spine like tickling fingers.
“She’s our crackerjack designer. We wouldn’t be in business if it weren’t for her.” He turned slightly to hook a thumb toward his chest. “The rest of us who work here? We’re just grease monkeys. Becky’s the one with the talent and the vision.”
His cell buzzed in his pocket. He didn’t need to pull it out to know it was Knox.
He should answer.
He didn’t want to. He didn’t want to hear that frenetic excitement again. And he certainly didn’t want to hear any more lies.
No one ever talked about how love could be a blade that twists inside a person. How it can make a guy bleed out in places nobody can see.
“You’re not the only night owl, I see.” Agent O’Toole’s voice pulled at the knots in his tangled mind.
When he frowned in confusion, she hitched her chin toward his noisy pocket. “When someone phones me at four o’clock in the morning, I figure they’re either a night owl or there’s an emergency. You need to get that?”
“It can wait,” he assured her and opened the large front door.
The shop floor was dark. But he remedied that by throwing on the four switches that had the huge overhead lights mounted three stories above blazing to life.
Agent Douglas whistled again as the row of custom choppers blazed into sight. Paint glistened. Chrome gleamed. Hand-tooled leather seats glinted dully.
“Wow.” Agent O’Toole walked over to the last bike in the row. It was Britt’s ride. But she couldn’t know that. “Now I understand the need for the razor wire and all the security cameras. These aren’t motorcycles. These are works of art.”
When she ran her hand over the leather seat, Britt felt like she was touching him. Chills skipped up his spine.
His voice was gruff when he said, “Y’all feel free to look at our stock while I go wake everyone.”
“Everyone?” Agent O’Toole lifted one eyebrow.
“We’re more like family than coworkers,” he explained. “We’ll all want to hear what you have to say.”
He didn’t wait for a response before heading upstairs. Five minutes later, he was leading the crew—who sported various degrees of dishabille—back down to the shop floor.
Introductions were made and Julia blinked myopically at the gathered group of men.
Of the six active-duty Knights, only Hunter was missing. He and his wife, Grace, had recently moved out of the old factory building and into a small condo in the Streeterville neighborhood. But everyone else was present and accounted for.
There was Sam Harwood, whose SpongeBob SquarePants pajama bottoms had been a Christmas gift from Hannah, his purple-haired girlfriend. Fisher, who’d been naked as a jaybird when Britt slipped through the open door into his dark bedroom, had thankfully redonned his jeans and T-shirt from the day before. Hewitt Birch wore plaid Joe Boxer briefs and a white tank top. But it was Graham Colburn who caught Agent O’Toole’s eye.
Not that Britt could blame her for gaping.
For one thing, Graham was six-and-a-half feet tall. For another thing, Graham hadn’t bothered to throw a shirt on top of his gray sweatpants, so his John Cena muscles bulged and gleamed in the overhead light. And lastly, Graham wore an expression that said he ate small children and puppies for breakfast.
Inexplicably, Britt felt a frisson of jealousy. He had to bite his tongue to keep from telling Graham to go put a shirt on.
“Well.” Agent O’Toole cleared her throat. “Seems the gang’s all here.”
“The gang’s always here,” Fisher informed her. “It’s one of the perks of livin’ and workin’ in the same buildin’.”
The little agent’s brow furrowed. “Not too many jobs offer onsite living quarters nowadays.”
Fisher shrugged. “It’s either let us live here or double our salaries. And since this place has the space.” He gestured around the cavernous shop. “It’s pretty much a no-brainer which one Boss and Becky chose.”
“Boss and Becky are the owners?” Agent O’Toole hadn’t taken out her phone to record their conversation, but Britt knew she was filing away information, nonetheless.
“That’d be them,” he told her and felt the instant her eyes landed on him.
