“How do you know?” Tanner asked. He hated to be obvious, but he got the feeling Trevor wasn’t seeing the situation clearly.
“Because I could smell her arousal.”
“Oh,” Trevor said.
Okay, that was definitely TMI. There was a reason men didn’t share this kind of stuff with their friends.
“Up until that point, I’d assumed Alina was very good at deception and that she was playing the role Dick had given her. But you can’t fake arousal, no matter how good you are.”
Tanner couldn’t argue with that. “What are you going do?”
“I have no frigging idea.” Trevor dropped his back on the couch and stared up at the ceiling as if the answer was written there. Or maybe he was simply looking for divine inspiration. “I want to ignore what my head is saying, just go with my instincts, and trust her. I want to believe this thing that seems to be going on between us is real. But at the end of the day, how do I toss aside all my doubt and trust her completely, knowing that if I do, and she’s dirty, it won’t be me paying the price? It will be our friends.”
Tanner would have answered, but he had no idea what to say. He sucked at relationships almost as much as he did at giving personal advice. Fortunately, Trevor’s phone rang, relieving him of the responsibility of solving his friend’s dilemma.
Trevor pulled out his phone and looked at it warily, as if he was worried it might be Alina calling to ask if they were talking about her. After a moment, he thumbed the button and put it to his ear.
“No, Evan. It didn’t go well tonight,” Trevor said in a deadpan voice. “Is there another reason you called?”
Evan must have said something interesting, because Trevor told him to hold on. “I’m putting you on speaker so Tanner can hear.” He pressed the button. “Go ahead.”
“Vivian just called,” Evan said. Vivian was the receptionist at the main office in DC. She acted as their eyes and ears at that facility, even though there wasn’t much going on there lately. “Thorn booked one of the classified conference rooms at the DCO office in DC. He didn’t give her an exact time but just told her to reserve the room for the next two days.”
Trevor frowned. “Why would he bother using one of our classified conference rooms? He must have at least half a dozen of them at Chadwick-Thorn.”
“I was wondering the same thing,” Evan said. “The only reason I can think of for why he might want to use one of our rooms instead of his is if what he’s discussing is so secret he can’t risk anyone at Chadwick-Thorn overhearing it. Their secure facilities are good, but ours are better.”
“Anything that classified is something we’re going to want to hear,” Trevor said.
“That’s what I was thinking,” Evan said. “Which is why I called you.”
“Is there any way we can get someone into that meeting?” Tanner asked.
He’d only been to the DC office once. While it was hidden in the basement of the EPA building on Pennsylvania Avenue, it was fancy as hell, not to mention secure.
“Not a chance,” Evan said. “Thorn will almost certainly have his own security people there to keep people out. If we’re going to hear what they’re saying in there, it’s going to have to be covert.”
Trevor chuckled. “Fortunately, we work for a covert organization that’s damn good at snooping on people. See if you can find someone you still trust in IT, and ask if they have a listening device we can get into the conference room.”
“Getting a wire that can do the job won’t be the problem—it’s getting it into the room,” Evan said. “If Thorn’s people are any good, they’ll sweep the room before the meeting, so we can’t put the listening device in there ahead of time. It will have to go in at the last minute, and that might be tough.”
“Leave that to me,” Trevor told him. “You get the bug and make sure we find out exactly when Thorn is holding the meeting.”
“I’m on it.”
“You think this has something to do with this big move we’ve all been waiting for Thorn to make?” Tanner asked after Evan hung up.
“I hope so,” Trevor said. “Because if not, I’m not sure how else we’re going to get the son of a bitch. We’ve dug into every lead and gone down every rabbit hole looking for something to put the man away. I don’t know what else to do.”
Tanner wanted to put Thorn away as much as Trevor did, but it was looking less likely with every passing day. Even this classified meeting was a long shot. For all they knew, Thorn merely wanted a fancy place to hold one of his weapons program briefings for the DOD.
He and Trevor sat there in silence for a while, watching the fourth quarter of a game that even the fans in the stadium had given up on and walked out.
“So what are you going to do about Alina?” Tanner asked as the ref finally—and mercifully—announced the game was over.
Trevor shrugged. “Pick her up for work in the morning, then take it from there.”
Tanner considered suggesting Trevor try talking to Alina instead but thought better of it. Trevor was as crappy at talking to women as he was, so it would be a train wreck. Better to pray and hope for the best.
