Page 29 of Velvet Vaughn

Chapter Six

The eggs hit the buttered pan with a hiss. Anja propped a hip against the counter and watched Leo cook.

It was not, strictly speaking, part of the job.

Though she could argue that it was. A woman in her line of work learned a client by watching them do the ordinary things. Those were where the tells lived. How a man held a knife told her about his temper. His stance at the stove showed whether he could keep his hands steady when someone walked in behind him. How he moved in his own kitchen told her what he looked like when the floor had dropped out from under him, and he was pretending, for her benefit, that it hadn’t.

Leo was doing okay. Not great, but he was holding it together.

He’d pushed up his sleeves again and added a crack of pepper from a mill he kept within arm’s reach. Four pieces of wheat bread dropped into a toaster that looked expensive enough to have its own opinions. His breathing had slowed down to something normal about ninety seconds after he’d pulled the skillet out of the cabinet. Keeping busy was the ground wire. Leo needed somewhere to put his hands.

She understood that. It was one of about a dozen things she had in common with him, and she was choosing to notice only the useful ones tonight.

“Cheese?” he asked without turning around.

“If you have it.”

“I have it.”

“Then yes.”

He opened the fridge, pulled out a block of sharp white cheddar, and grated a heap directly into the eggs. She wondered if he’d taken a cooking class. That was professional-level skill. She studied his shoulders for the half-second it took him to close the fridge and turn back to the stove. That was where the tension lived first and left last. Leo’s had come down about an inch since he’d jumped up from the barstool.

Good.

Part of her mission tonight was on the flash drive. Most of it was keeping the man next to it on his feet.

Her phone buzzed with Kayla’s ringtone. Anja read the text.

Report when you can. Don’t need details. Just want to know you’re not dead.

She typed back one line.

Alive. Working. Will call in the morning.

The response came before she’d set the phone down.

Copy. Tell him hi from us.

Anja smirked at the screen. As if she would admit to Leo that she’d been talking about him to her coworkers.

She put the phone down again and lifted her gaze.

Leo was looking at her over his shoulder.

The eggs were moving in the pan, the spoon in his hand carving a slow figure-eight, but his attention was entirely on her face. Whatever he’d read there had etched a line between his eyebrows.

“Trouble?” he asked.

“No. Coworker making sure I made it safely.”

Leo turned back to the stove before either of them had to look at the other any longer than was reasonable. He slid the eggs off the heat and onto two plates. The toast popped. He buttered the slices and laid them beside the eggs. A sprinkle of chives appeared out of nowhere. He carried the plates around the island and set one down in front of the stool she’d claimed, his shoulder brushing hers as he passed.

She felt it through a layer of cotton. A professional wouldn’t log it, but an honest woman would.

He pulled his stool around and sat down. The exhale he let out when his weight came off his feet was involuntary, revealing how hard the evening had been on him.

For one second, she considered reaching over and putting her hand on his forearm.