going stubborn before it fell. “I got it from a friend. Okay? Look, there’s a lot about my time in the Navy I can’t talk about.”
“Because it’s classified.”
“Yeah.”
“And the friend you got the disruptor from is probably classified, too.” The friend was either some kind of intelligence agent or something far worse. The friend could be a corporate spy who looked to Kyle for help.
Kyle sighed. “The friend I got it from is dead. I don’t talk about her because…I don’t talk about her. But she’s been on my mind lately. That must be why I thought I saw her earlier. It was a woman who looked a little like her, though not really. It was more the way she moved.”
Was he talking about Julia Ennis? “A girlfriend?”
Kyle chuckled, a humorless sound. “She’s the reason I don’t believe in love. She’s the one I misread. Look, I didn’t talk to Big Tag about the disruptor because I figured he would ask me to give it to him. I need it.”
What other tech did he have? “Is that how you got through my security system last night?”
The slightest flush stained his cheeks. “How did you… Did it show up on the logs? Because I thought it wouldn’t.”
“It wouldn’t have if I hadn’t written specific protocols. It’s not a normal security system.” Not a total lie, but he wasn’t about to tell Kyle that he’d gotten caught through good old-fashioned human eyesight. That would lead to questions of why the hell Michael Malone was watching him. No, he’d found using words like protocols threw off the people who weren’t hard-core hackers.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done it.” Kyle sank into the chair beside him. “I need you to know that I have been in that apartment every night since we started the job. I swear I have. Last night, I just…I couldn’t sleep, and you don’t have a treadmill. Sometimes it’s the only way I get myself tired enough to fall asleep. Last night I actually managed to doze off, but I woke up at two in the morning and I couldn’t stay in bed.”
“You couldn’t stay in the house,” Hutch accused.
Kyle shook his head. “No, I couldn’t. I’m sorry. I had a shitty dream and I had to burn it off.”
That didn’t explain the phone call he’d made or why he had two phones to begin with. He wasn’t sure he could ask that question without giving up the fact that Michael had been following him. “You want to talk about it?”
“No.”
“Okay.” He couldn’t force the guy to trust him.
Kyle pushed off the chair. “I knew this wouldn’t work.”
“The job? No, it probably won’t work if you can’t stay in a house with a client you’re guarding.”
“Well, I figured you would take care of her. It’s not like she was alone.”
It was time for some hard truth. He knew Tag wanted to keep Kyle around until he figured out what was happening, but Hutch wasn’t going to let that secondary mission put Noelle in danger. “You’re the one who is supposed to be watching our backs. Had I gotten the heads-up that you needed a break, I would have paid more attention to security.”
Secondary mission? Now he had a third—getting the feds everything they wanted so they would leave Noelle alone. That was the deal he’d made this afternoon. He would find a way to get the financial records to prove Genedyne was a fraud and they would leave Noelle alone. Of course, he couldn’t simply tell Noelle what he was doing. He’d had to sign an agreement that all of this would be confidential.
Or his pact to keep Noelle safe would dissolve, and she could be forced to risk her career and possibly her life to keep her research safe. The feds knew exactly how to bust a man’s balls.
Kyle nodded and seemed to think something over. “That’s fair. Have you talked to Big Tag?”
He didn’t want to lie to the man, but he also wasn’t sure Kyle wouldn’t simply walk away. “I don’t want to.”
“It won’t happen again.” Kyle groaned and his head dropped back, an obviously frustrated move. “Or maybe it will. Fuck, I should never have come home.”
“Why did you?”
Kyle’s head came back up, and there was an unmistakable weariness in his gaze. “I don’t know. I guess I hoped it would make things better. I left because things didn’t make sense anymore. I came back because I hoped being home would feel safe. I was in