He paused. “You know that isn’t how this works.”
I shook my head. “I’m sorry. It’s a personal issue and it has to be dealt with, but I can’t work at least for the next month or so.”
He snickered. “Nice joke.”
“I’m not joking, Agent Baker. I’ve got an emergency in my life that can’t wait. I have to deal with it. I understand our agreement and why I entered into it, but it can’t take precedence over my family.”
“You don’t have family, Chloe.”
I blinked. “I’ve got Lexi and her daughter. They’re my family.”
“And I’m sure they’ll be just fine without you for an hour when you meet me—”
I cut him off again. “I can’t, Agent Baker. I’m sorry.”
“You listen here, Chloe. There are protocols you need to jump through. Things you need to abide by. You signed a contract, and you know what’s going to happen if you break it.”
“I know it puts you guys in a bind, but all I’m asking for is a month. That’s it. After that, we go right back to the agreement until the contract fulfills itself.”
He chuckled. “Or maybe you really don’t care about being arrested and tossed into prison. Maybe you wouldn’t care about being ripped away from… oh, what’s his name? The guy you were arguing with in the parking lot with the leather cut?”
My blood went cold. “What did you just say?”
“You women are all the same. So quick to save yourselves until you get dicked down by some guy. You backing out wouldn’t have anything to do with him, now, would it? Miss ‘I’m All About Family’?”
My voice grew unsteady. “Leave him out of this.”
“Ah! West. That’s right. Sorry, had to find my file on the man.”
I narrowed my eyes. “This has nothing to do with him. Like I said, it’s about family. I have a family emergency that you can’t keep me from. Even that is in my contract.”
“With proof, yes. You bring me proof that there’s some family emergency, and of course you can have your time off. But even still, you’d have to meet with me, so you might as well get some work done while we meet up.”
His laughter made me sick to my stomach. I wanted to reach through the phone and claw his fucking eyes out. Bile worked its way up the back of my throat and it took everything I had not to turn around and vomit in the sink.
Because I knew if West heard me gagging like that, he’d be out of bed and at my side in a heartbeat.
“This has nothing to do with him,” I said as calmly as possible.
But Agent Baker simply snickered. “Whether you like it or not, I’m not the idiot you think I am. You think I don’t keep tabs on my informants? I know what you’re up to. I know who you’re fucking. I know where you are and who you’re with at all times. And if I don’t know currently? I’ll know soon. I don’t ever stop my surveillance. I don’t ever allow my informants to have slack they don’t deserve. And until you prove to me that you can be trusted, you’ll never be let out of your contract. You show no remorse for what you did—”
“For what I did almost seven years ago,” I hissed.
“Sounds like a personal problem, doesn’t it?”
I wiped at the hot, angry tears threatening to spill down my face. “What the hell do you want from me, you sick fuck?”
He chuckled. “You give me the information I want on who you’re with as well as this case, or I’ll make sure West and whatever crew he’s part of gets wrapped up in all of this shit. I’ll take them all down, and it’ll be all your fault, Miss Chloe.”
I sank to my knees. “Please, leave them out of this. They didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Then, we can start by meeting up for lunch. One o’clock. The restaurant. And come alone this time, would you? The last thing I want to do is put a bullet in some hefty motorcycle rider because he thinks he’s above the law.”
I gagged before I swallowed it back down. “Fine. I’ll see you then.”
“Wonderful. That wasn’t so hard now, was it?”
He hung up the phone and I pulled myself up from the floor. I turned on the water flow of the sink as high as it could go before I threw up stomach bile into the porcelain crater. My body shook. Sweat broke out on my brow. And as I perched on the edge of the bathroom counter, my head spun with so many things.
