I craned my eyes over my shoulder and watched him nod. “You, sure. Her, not so much.”
“Then, trust me that we’re doing something important.”
Stone crossed his arms over his chest. “And if I demand an answer as to where you guys are going?”
And that was when Chloe got creative. “You want to hear all about my heavy flow periods and how I don’t have feminine products here that work because the pain is—”
Stone waved his hands in the air. “Go, go, go. Good, God. So damn dramatic around here.”
I had a smile on my face all the way to the restaurant. Chloe had thought very well on her feet, and seeing Stone flustered like that despite the fact that he and Hayley were expecting tickled my funny bone. Damn, some men were so fucking sensitive when it came to feminine issues. I didn’t see a problem with them at all. So fucking what? That was how their bodies worked.
But once we pulled into the parking lot of the practically-deserted diner, I parked my bike as close as I could to the darkened alleyway beside it.
“He’s over there,” Chloe said as she pointed.
I watched as the suited man got out of the car. He stared us down as he stalked toward us, his hand already approaching his weapon.
“Don’t talk to him until I do,” she whispered as she slid off the back of the bike.
But that idiot made the mistake of drawing his gun. “You want to tell me what the fuck you’re doing bringing someone like him in during a—”
“West, no!” she exclaimed.
I grabbed the man’s wrist and twisted down before sliding the gun out of his hand. I disarmed it and ejected the magazine, then cocked it so that the extra bullet that had already been chambered hit the ground. I wrapped my fist up in his suit tie and dragged him into the alleyway, slamming him against the wall so hard that he lost his breath.
“West, what the hell are you doing?” Chloe hissed.
I didn’t care, though. He’d drawn a gun on us, and he wasn’t about to get away with it.
“No cameras, so no evidence,” I growled.
The FBI agent gasped for air. “You’ll never get away with this.”
“No,” I said as I pinned him to the wall with my forearm against his throat, “what you won’t get away with is exploiting one of your informants and harassing her because you think her life is yours to control. She has a contract to inform for you, but we’re going to have our own lawyers take a look over it. Want to know why?”
Chloe stayed silent as the FBI agent glared at me. “Why, you fucking meathead?”
I snarled. “Because one of my best friends was part of one of those contracts before. I know how they go. I know what their deal is. And I know damned good and well that your tracking of Chloe via her GPS and you wanting to search her technology anytime you want is a violation of that contract. We’re going to peg you for it, and when we do, we won’t stop until your job is ours.”
Fear flooded his eyes. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“I wouldn’t?” I asked as I pressed my knee between his legs, threatening to pop his balls like they were water balloons. “Why don’t you keep pushing her. Keep tracking her. Keep controlling her life from a distance and see what happens.”
“No!” Chloe exclaimed.
I cocked my fist back and punched the guy across his jaw. He crumpled to the ground like a little bitch and I slammed my steel-toed boot into his ribcage. Chloe grabbed my arm, pulling me away as the man spat blood onto the cracked, stained concrete of the alleyway.
And when he looked up at me, the fear in his eyes was almost intoxicating.
“Come after Chloe and see what happens. I dare you,” I growled. “Unless, of course, you want to make Chloe’s contract disappear altogether.”
“What?” she asked breathlessly.
I held up my finger to her, silencing her in her tracks. “You want to save your own ass? Save your own career from ruin when we expose what you’ve been doing to her? Lose her contract. Lose her number. Don’t you ever fucking call her again. And if you want her help on a job? You can contract out her services hourly. How’s that sound for fair?”
The agent nodded quickly. “I’ll do it. I’ll make it disappear. Just, please, would you stop?”
I grabbed his hair and tilted his face toward mine. “You’ve got three hours to text her visible proof that her contract is done. You don’t get us that proof? We serve you with papers by the end of the day.”
